Aesthetic Education

In this paper we examine the potential of writing and performing poetry to empower young people from marginalized backgrounds to participate in the political life of their communities. Our method combines philosophical analysis with the design and implementation of a poetry workshop in Coventry. Drawing on Cavell’s notion of ‘acknowledgement’, we begin with a philosophical account of the pedagogy that informed the workshop’s design. We then explore how this account informed implementation of the workshop. Finally, we present the results. To (...) unpack the significance of our findings, we examine two poems performed by young people at the project’s concluding event. On empirical and philosophical grounds, we argue that writing and performing poetry can play a role in political education, for it opens space for what we call ‘the acknowledgment of voice.’. (shrink)

In Essays on Beauty & the Arts (2023) (‘Essays’), Dominic McIver Lopes has unearthed something of a champion for his ongoing mission to rejuvenate analytic aesthetics. ‘The history of analytic aesthetics’, Lopes declares, ‘is dominated by writing on Kant and, to a lesser extent, David Hume. … We badly need to excavate alternatives to the tradition of Hume and Kant’ (p. xvi). As tall of an order this already is, the height of Lopes’s hopes for Bolzano appears to reach further (...) still—‘Perhaps Bolzano can do for aesthetics what Mill and Kant do for ethics’ (p. xxv). While the jury is still out on whether Bolzano can fill those shoes, what is clear is that Lopes succeeds at making a tantalizing case on Bolzano’s behalf. (shrink)

Internal coherence is of great importance for how we think about appreciating objects of aesthetic worth. A disagreement between what we judge to be worthy and what we affectively favor can prevent us from properly grasping its value. However, it is also assumed in the aesthetic domain that our taste changes over time, jeopardising such coherence constraint. These changes can lead to a mismatch between new aesthetic judgments and old aesthetic preferences. This chapter explores a number of issues that emerge (...) from this tension. Using Taylor Swift’s re-recording as a case study, I will explore the relation between fan loyalty and personal authenticity, as well as the role of biographical taste in the reception of these newly recorded albums among Swift’s long-time fanbase. (shrink)

Through an examination of Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men, this book demonstrates the ability of cinematic fictions, and other complex narrative fictions, to contribute to meeting the climate challenge by shaping the desires of audiences. What if there was a single feature film that showed us everything we need to know about climate catastrophe culture? What if that same film also made the philosophies of Slavoj Zizek, Mark Fisher, Francis Fukuyama, and Fredric Jameson accessible? Identifying the climate challenge as a (...) cultural challenge, this book provides an unprecedented criminological analysis of both Children of Men and Fisher's oeuvre from 1998 to 2022, and demonstrates the capacity of cinematic narratives to shape climate catastrophe culture. Seeking to be part of the solution to the climate challenge, it is the first criminological study to link the capacity of cinematic fictions to shape desire to solutions to the climate crisis. It is also the most detailed, and most rigorous criminological case studies of a cinematic work to date. Anthropocide: An Essay in Green Cultural Criminology will be of great interest to students and scholars of green criminology, cultural criminology, narrative criminology, film theory, philosophy of film, and ecocriticism. (shrink)

This work by fourteen authors, on the topic of aesthetic values, ethics, and education, gathers contributors from diverse backgrounds. University professors, theologians, international practitioners, music performers, and literary artists from different continents, i.e. Africa, Asia, and Europe, explore the profound intersection between intercultural and universal values, ethical considerations, and education through arts. The book presents essays and poems addressing the value and role of arts in challenging cultural and societal norms to nurture reasoning and social responsibility, and ultimately to promote (...) intercultural dialogue and understanding with ethics in aesthetic value and education to foster respect and collaboration. In exploring the profound intersection between these parameters through arts, this book invites readers to reimagine the world, ethics, and critical thinking in contemporary society. (shrink)

This paper seeks to initiate a theory of “imaginative dialogues” by articulating four dialogical principles that enable such a dialogue to occur. It is part of a larger project that takes the Socratic dialogue, a widely utilized conversation technique in philosophy education, as a starting point and aims to reinterpret it by shifting emphasis to the pre-reflective, pre-linguistic, and multimodal aspects of dialogues, involving both their verbal and embodied dimensions. To integrate the verbal dimensions of a dialogue with its more (...) elusive embodied dimensions, the paper will examine the notion ‘dialogue’ from the perspective of two different strategies. The first strategy chiefly focuses on the dialogic encounter. The ‘in-between’ of this dialogic encounter enables something to emerge that transcends the individual perspective of the speakers involved. The second strategy is primarily concerned with internal differentiation. The minor differences that constitute this internal differentiation, differentiate a dialogue from within. These strategies are not mutually exclusive but indicate a variation in starting point and orientation. This paper proposes to combine these two strategies by linking accounts of the productive moments in verbal dialogues to an account of the imaginative potential of embodied dialogues. This will enable the articulation of four dialogical principles (derived from Lev Yakubinsky, Oswald Ducrot, Martin Buber, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz) through which an imaginative dialogue can proceed. (shrink)

Many have argued that certain statues or monuments are objectionable, and thus ought to be removed. Even if their arguments are compelling, a major obstacle is the apparent historical value of those commemorations. Preservation in some form seems to be the best way to respect the value of commemorations as connections to the past or opportunities to learn important historical lessons. Against this, I argue that we have exaggerated the historical value of objectionable commemorations. Sometimes commemorations connect to biased or (...) distorted versions of history, if not mere myths. We can also learn historical lessons through what I call repudiatory honouring: the honouring of certain victims or resistors that can only make sense if the oppressor(s) or target(s) of resistance are deemed unjust, where no part of the original objectionable commemorations is preserved. This type of commemorative practice can even help to overcome some of the obstacles objectionable commemorations pose against properly connecting to the past. (shrink)

Here is a puzzle about aesthetic education. In a variety of contexts, we commit significant time, energy, and resources to aesthetic education. We teach (and in many cases publicly subsidize) university courses and degrees that have aesthetic education as their primary aim; we also invest public resources into museums, including enrichment programs that are also designed to afford aesthetic education. It would seem that if our commitment to aesthetic education is rational, then aesthetic appreciation is something that can be done (...) better or worse. However, we also, in a variety of contexts (oddly enough, some of them being the same sorts of contexts that are designed to abet aesthetic education), act as if it is true that there is no disputing taste. We may try to persuade students to come around to particular judgments, but we do not penalize students for judging one way or another. The aim of this paper is to dissolve the apparent puzzle of aesthetic education by clarifying its aims and advancing a conception of it that deemphasizes the role of taste. I claim that, pace “the default view of aesthetic education” (as I shall call it), the primary purpose of aesthetic education is not to educate taste. It is, rather, to facilitate the development of certain perceptual-cognitive capacities so as to enhance aesthetic experience and improve aesthetic appreciation. Thus, I call the view of aesthetic education advanced here “a perceptual-cognitive model”. (shrink)

Die Hochschule für Künste Bremen (HfK) gehört zu den wenigen Kunsthochschulen in Deutschland, die die Fachbereiche Musik, Kunst und Design unter einem Dach vereint. 2018 richtete die HfK Bremen eine bundesweit einzigartige Professur ein, die an der Schnittstelle dieser Fachbereiche angesiedelt ist. In diesem Rahmen entstand der durch den bildenden Künstler, Performer und Musiker Raphael Sbrzesny initiierte fachübergreifende Laborraum, die „Interpret*innenkammer“, der die Qualitäten einer Probebühne, eines Proberaums und eines Ateliers in sich vereint. Über fünf Jahre und in rund 50 (...) Projekten konnte sich in der Folge eine Form der künstlerischen Lehre entwickeln, in der sich Theorie und Praxis, Affirmation und Kritik, Traditionsbewusstsein und Gegenwartsbezug auf neue Weise miteinander verbinden. Im Zentrum der polyphonen Werkstatt stehen kooperative und kollaborative Arbeitsformen, erweiterte Konzertformate, ortsspezifische Interventionen mit einem Fokus auf öffentlichem Raum sowie große transdisziplinäre Performanceprojekte zwischen Design, freier Kunst, digitalen Medien und Musik. -/- Die Publikation Interpret*innenkammer – Polyphone Werkstatt. Sound, Performance & Konzept ist als offenes Archiv angelegt, das in 50 Heften verschiedene interdisziplinäre Lehrprojekte rund um die Professur für Kreation und Interpretation mit den Schwerpunkten Sound, Performance und Konzept an der HfK Bremen dokumentiert. Mit Beiträgen von Fabian Goppelsröder, Christina Scheib, Judith-Frederike Popp, Wolfgang Ullrich, Bastian Zimmermann und Raphael Sbrzesny. (shrink)

In this paper I investigate Dewey's view of how institutions might use fine art to contribute to democracy. I first show that Dewey’s pragmatic conception of democracy is a collaborative problem-solving effort to enhance human experience. Ithen establish two Deweyan criteria of what I call an “institution of democratic art”. The first involves the curation of artworks with a democratic message, and the second involves the democratic process by which the institution selects those works. I then explain Dewey’s pragmatic conception (...) of aesthetics, where art emerges as a solution to social needs and problems, and, contrary to what traditional museums do, how art should not be isolated from its original social context. I then analyze the success of two examples Dewey gives of institutions of democratic art: the Barnes Foundation and The Section of Fine Arts. I argue that they both succeeded with their art’s democratic content, although their art selection process could have been more democratic. Finally, I show how a Deweyan notion of an institution of democratic art is relevant to recent discussions of controversial public art. (shrink)

Against caricatures of the poet-philosopher Friedrich Schiller as an unoriginal popularizer of Kant, or a forerunner of totalitarianism, Frederick Beiser reinterprets him as an innovative, classical republican, broadening his analysis to include Schiller’s poetry, plays, and essays not widely available in English translation, such as the remarkable essay, “On Grace and Dignity.” In that spirit, the present article argues that the latter text, misperceived by Anglophone critics as self-contradictory, is better understood as centering on gender and dance. In brief, grace (...) is a virtuous power of beautiful gestures associated with women, while dignity is a power of sublime gestures associated with men, and the improvised combination thereof is a divinely androgynous power of gesture that I term “stateliness,” in a three-step choreography of aesthetic education. (shrink)

Justice for painful experiences or human rights violations is pursued in many forms. In furtherance of justice, individuals and communities adopt creative and meaningful ways to express their pain, heal, and become more resilient. One such practice is dance—an arts-based solution with both therapeutic value and the power to promote physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Dance has been described as a much-needed “solution to the problems of the world”, and “an important player in countering tyranny [that] helps heal the wounds (...) of torture and trauma and build a more humane society.” A closer look at dance-based interventions also signals the limitations of legal and political mechanisms and practices (courts, tribunals, policy, etc.) in matters of justice and well-being. (shrink)

Abstract:The purpose of this introduction is to set out the scope and content of this special issue of the Journal of Aesthetic Education, which takes Aesthetic Education through Narrative Art as its subject. I begin by delineating the “aesthetic” itself and then identifying the denotation of “aesthetic education” with which the issue’s authors are concerned. This is followed by a characterization of “narrative art” that belies my preference for representation rather than art and draws attention to the multiple modes of (...) representation that constitute complex narratives. I next turn to the title of the special issue, an abridged version of Aesthetic Education through Narrative Art and its Relevance for the Humanities, which is an installation research project funded by the Croatian Science Foundation to investigate the relationship between aesthetic and artistic values on the one hand and ethical, political, and social values on the other. The project is multidisciplinary among philosophy, criminology, film studies, and cognitive science, and three of the authors are members of the project team. I conclude by introducing each of the six articles, which employ two approaches, one from philosophical aesthetics and the other from critical criminology. (shrink)

Abstract:Frantz Fanon is best known as the author of two monographs: Black Skin, White Masks (1952), a literary and psychological account of Black experience and anti-Black racism, and The Wretched of the Earth (1961), a political manifesto arguing for the need to respond to colonial oppression with revolutionary violence. His critics contend that the disciplinary division evinces a failure to successfully integrate the psychological with the political, which detracts from his intellectual legacy. In this article, I employ criminologist Jon Frauley’s (...) theory of the analytic value of fictional film to demonstrate that Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049 (2017) not only provides an empirical referent for Fanon’s psychological and political theories but also reveals an underlying coherence that is not always obvious. I begin with a summary of Frauley’s theory and then alternate between Fanon’s theories and the way in which the film provides those theories with empirical referents. My conclusion, which highlights an essential continuity between individual transcendence and collective action in Fanon, draws on both Blade Runner 2049 and the military tactic of pseudo operations, which was employed to devastating effect against anti-colonial struggles in Africa in the second half of the twentieth century. (shrink)

شهد قطاع التعليم المغربي عدة تغييرات شملت مجالات متنوعة إن على مستوى المنهاج أو إصلاح الفضاءات التعليمية أو تكوين المدرسين. ولعل مردّ ذلك هو الانفجار المعرفيّ المتزايد، والمكانة المتميّزة للتّربية والتّعليم، واهتمامات الدولة التي أصبحت مركزة على الظواهر المدرسية وفي علاقتها بتغيير المجتمع وارتباطها بالأسرة والمحيط، وتأثرها بالمرجعية الثقافية والدينية، وتفاعلها مع الظروف السياسية والاقتصادية انطلاقا من التيمات الكبرى التي أُنتِجت حول المدرسة من قبيل تصرفات المتعلم وسلوكياته داخل المدرسة، وعلاقات المدرسة بالآباء، وظاهرة العنف، والهدر المدرسي، ودراسة العلاقات التربوية، والأدوار (...) التربوية، والجماعات التربوية. وتأسيسا على ذلك، أصبح الاهتمام بالتّربية والتّعليم من الأولويات في المملكة المغربية، كما انصب الاهتمام بالمدرسة والتنشئة الاجتماعية، و تم التركيز على دراسة الأنظمة التربوية والظواهر المدرسية ودورها في تغيير المجتمع من خلال علاقتها مع الأسرة والمحيط، وتأثرها بالمرجعية الثقافية والدينية، وتفاعلها مع الظروف السياسية والاقتصادية إذ أُضيفت إلى المدرسة رسائل جديدة ومهمّات متجدّدة؛ لضمان المتعة الثّقافيّة والحضاريّة والمعرفيّة والقيميّة في عالم أضحى يعيش على إيقاع مفاهيم جديدة ليس أقلّها شأنا... مفهوم المواطنة الكونيّة أو العالميّة. و أضحت وظائفها تلامس مختلف جوانب الإنسان لتأهيله وجعله ذلك الكائن الذي يعرف ذاته أولا ثم يكتشف الآخر ثانيا. وإذا ما نظرنا إلى هذه الوظائف نجدها متعددة، نظرا لتعدد أغراض وأهداف الإنسان، فمنها ما هو تربوي وتعليمي ثم إداري، واجتماعي وأمني، وتكويني، ومنها ما هو إيديولوجي، وإرشادي وتوجيهي، وتواصلي، واقتصادي... وبذلك تؤثر على سلوك الأفراد تأثيرا منظما. والمدرسة من حيث هي كذلك، وباعتبارها الوجه الحقيقي للنظام التربوي ككل، تنصب وظيفتها الرئيسة على سلوك الناشئة، ويقاس مدى تحقيقها لوظائفها بمدى التغيير الذي تنجح في تحقيقه في سلوك أبنائها ومن ثم كان ضروريا أن ينظر إليها نظرة شمولية كنظرتنا نحو المجتمع برمته، وأن تكون في مقدمة وطليعة كل سياسة إصلاحية للمجتمع، وأن ينظر إليها كمرجعية لكل تغيير أو تغير قد تعرفه باقي القطاعات والجوانب الأخرى لحياة الفرد لأنها تستهدف تأهيله والرفع من قدرة فاعليته، بما يتوافق مع التغيرات والتطورات على المستويين المحلي والإقليمي والخارجي. فلا يمكن الحديث عن نظام تربوي ناجح في المستقبل، ما لم يتم استحضار التطور الحاصل في أدوار ووظائف وآليات اشتغال المدرسة، من خلال التعرف على سيرورات التحولات التي عرفتها المؤسسة التعليمية في الماضي والحاضر. (shrink)

ملخص: نروم في هذه الورقة البحثية أن نطرح إشكالية حضور المتعلم المغربي في بيداغوجيا الكفايات التي ناد بها النظام التربوي في ظل المشاكل التي تتخبط فيها المنظومة التعليمية التعلمية في بلادنا، ومسايرة لها للإصلاحات التي مست هذا القطاع، إيمانا منه أنها الحل الذي سينقد المدرسة المغربية من التراجع الملحوظ رغم العديد من الإصلاحات التي طالت التعليم وصولا إلى قانون الإطار لسنة 2019، وبحثا عن تحقيق الجودة، وتجاوز بيداغوجيا الأهداف التي تعتمد التلقين والحفظ والاسترجاع للمعرفة المتعلمة، لكن من خلال ما نلحظه (...) في الممارسة المهنية من تراجع لمستوى المتعلمات والمتعلمين في جميع المستويات (ابتدائي، إعدادي، ثانوي) جراء العديد من العوامل منها؛ الاكتظاظ، وغياب الحافر، والسلطة المعرفية للمدرس، وطول المقررات التي يصبح الهدف هو إتمامها في وقتها على حساب تحصيل الكفايات المطلوبة منها وما إلى ذلك، وهذا يجعلنا أمام معضلة كبيرة ألا وهي أننا نتوهم أننا نطبق بيداغوجيا الكفايات في العملية التعليمية التعلمية، وذلك لأنها وضعت في بيئة تربوية غير مناسبة للواقع التربوي والاجتماعي والثقافي والسياسي للمتعلم المغربي، ولجعل الكفايات في منظومتنا التعليمية يقتضي بالدرجة الأولى، الوعي بتطلعات الأطفال وقدراتهم وحاجاتهم الوجدانية- النفسية والمعرفية والحس حركية والفنية والاجتماعية، وهو ما تهدف إليه بيداغوجيا الكفايات كونها تتأسس على مبدأ المراهنة على المتعلم وجعله في قلب الاهتمام والتفكير. (shrink)

....تقديم: ..الصديق الصادقي العماري.. ...المدير ورئيس التحرير... إن واقعا بشريا يعيش تحديات ورهانات على مستوى المعرفة والعلم وعلاقتهما بمهننة التربية والعدالة الاجتماعية، إن على المستوى الاقتصادي أو فرص الحياة وأنماطها، لا يمكن تدبيره إلا في إطار جو ديمقراطي يتم فيه تدبير الشأن العام والبحث عن تحقيق الخير الأسمى للجميع بحرية وحوار ومشاركة عقلانية، وذلك من خلال استخلاص القيم والخصوصيات الضامنة للوحدة والهوية وتحليل الواقع، عبر التعامل النقدي مع المطالب الآنية في ظل إكراهات الواقع المحلي والدولي، واستشراف المستقبل، وذلك بالبحث عن (...) موطئ قدم في خريطة العالم التي أصبحت افتراضية إلى حد لا يتصور. فالحديث عن الإصلاح هو رهين بالاستجابة لحاجات المجتمع ومتطلباته. فعندما لا تكون المدرسة بمنتوجها المعرفي والمهاري والقيمي في مستوى تطلعات المجتمع وانتظاراته وتحولاته ورهاناته؛ أي عندما لا تكون المدرسة في وفاق مع المجتمع، أو تعجز عن التفاعل معه، حينها نكون أمام الأزمة. لذلك يلح الميثاق الوطني للتربية والتكوين منذ سنة 2000؛ في اختياراته وتوجهاته التربوية العامة على انفتاح المدرسة على المجتمع السوسيو-اقتصادي، وعلى العلاقة التفاعلية بين المدرسة والمجتمع باعتبارها محركا أساسا للتقدم الاجتماعي، وعاملا من عوامل الإنماء البشري المندمج، كما يلح الميثاق على اعتبار المدرسة مجالا حقيقيا لترسيـخ القيم الأخلاقية وقيم المواطنة وحقوق الإنسان وممارسة الحياة الديمقراطية، وهذه الفلسفة العامة هي التي توجه مراجعة المناهج التربوية، استنادا إلى مدخل بيداغوجي يتمثل في اعتماد التربية على القيم وتنمية وتطوير الكفايات التربوية والتربية المهنية. Revue Brochures Éducatives. n10,2023. (shrink)

There can be little doubt, from the enduring contemporary popularity of art galleries and museums, that such visual arts as painting and sculpture are sources of perceptual and emotional satisfaction and pleasure to a large viewing public. Still, given the contemporary unfamiliarity of much of the subject matter of past art and the absence of any clearly comprehensible subject matter in much modern (abstract and other) art, it may be less clear what younger or older viewers might come to learn (...) from their viewing of much or any educational value. This paper first offers an overview of the complex history of development of visual art from past to present in light of the shifting standards of artistic and aesthetic evaluation that have variously guided such development. However, it is argued that, while any educated appreciation of visual art cannot be had without some understanding of such history, it also requires a clear grasp of conceptual relations between the artistic and the aesthetic and of the significant interplay of diverse criteria of evaluation in any and all serious artworks past or present. Given this, visual arts may provide a unique route to educational understanding of the broadest liberal character. (shrink)

This paper is written for students of art and for teachers who are working to introduce students to art. It offers a practical answer to a practical question: how much time and attention should be directed toward a work of art that does not seem to be rewarding such an investment before deciding to give up and/or move on to an investment of time and attention in a different work of art? Reductionist tests such as “After fifteen minutes in a (...) cinema where reward seems unlikely, walk out” are clearly unsatisfactory as there are many counterexamples. The answer offered by this paper focuses on a twelve-point calculus of contextual factors: object-focused factors (artform categorization of the artwork, genre categorization of the artwork, genetics, instantiation/performance), collective subject-focused factors (recommendations, strength of venue, provenance, community consensus), and particular subject-focused factors (psychic preparation, engagement, information, interpretation). (shrink)

This paper aims to suggest some philosophical hints for an environmental education inspired by everyday aesthetics, a comparatively recent research field with many educational and ecological implications. Starting from the definition of everyday aesthetics, the discourse lingers on the connections between everyday aesthetics and education to finally come to the notion of “de-familiarization of familiar”, useful to dismantle the relation human being-environment in order to reconstruct it within a sustainable horizon. -/- Questo contributo intende offrire alcuni spunti filosofici per un’educazione (...) ambientale improntata all’everyday aesthetics, area di ricerca relativamente recente con molteplici implicazioni educative ed ecologiche. Partendo dalla definizione di estetica quotidiana, la trattazione si sofferma sui legami con l’educazione per approdare alla nozione di “de-familiarizzazione del familiare”, utile a destrutturare il rapporto uomo-ambiente per ricostruirlo in un orizzonte sostenibile. (shrink)

This paper aims to suggest some philosophical hints for an environmental education inspired by everyday aesthetics, a comparatively recent research field with many educational and ecological implications. Starting from the definition of everyday aesthetics, the discourse lingers on the connections between everyday aesthetics and education to finally come to the notion of “de-familiarization of familiar”, useful to dismantle the relation human being-environment in order to reconstruct it within a sustainable horizon. -/- Questo contributo intende offrire alcuni spunti filosofici per un’educazione (...) ambientale improntata all’everyday aesthetics, area di ricerca relativamente recente con molteplici implicazioni educative ed ecologiche. Partendo dalla definizione di estetica quotidiana, la trattazione si sofferma sui legami con l’educazione per approdare alla nozione di “de-familiarizzazione del familiare”, utile a destrutturare il rapporto uomo-ambiente per ricostruirlo in un orizzonte sostenibile. (shrink)

Unlike its moral and intellectual counterparts, the virtue of aesthetic humility has been widely neglected. In order to begin filling in this gap, I argue that Kant’s aesthetics is a promising resource for developing a model of aesthetic humility. Initially, however, this may seem like an unpromising starting point as Kant’s aesthetics might appear to promote aesthetic arrogance instead. In spite of this prima facie worry, I claim that Kant’s aesthetics provides an illuminating model of aesthetic humility that sheds light (...) not only on the self- and other-directed attitudes it involves, but also on how aesthetic humility can serve as a corrective to the vices of aesthetic arrogance and aesthetic servility. In addition to revealing the ways in which Kant’s aesthetics prizes humility rather than arrogance, I aim to show that the Kantian model of aesthetic humility can enrich our understanding of humility more generally and contribute to the on-going effort in aesthetics to analyse specific aesthetic virtues and vices. (shrink)

Patrick Fessenbecker is Assistant Professor in Cultures, Civilizations, and Ideas at Bilkent University in Ankara. Reading Ideas in Victorian Literature is his first monograph and constitutes a substantial development of the argument he introduced in ‘In Defense of Paraphrase’, the essay that won New Literary History’s Ralph W. Cohen Prize in 2013. The purpose of the book is twofold: to problematize the formalist approach that has achieved hegemony in contemporary literary studies and to offer an alternative way of approaching literary (...) theory and literary criticism, which can be conceived as ‘content formalism’ (p. 29). Fessenbecker provides a humorous but nonetheless accurate summary of his aim as defending the ‘meaning-mongers’ (Joshua Landy’s term) from the ‘form-fetishists’ (p. 17) in order to promote the marginalized tradition of ‘thoughtful reading’ (p. 18). The monograph consists of six chapters bookended by a long introduction and a short epilogue and although it is not divided into parts, two chapters each are devoted to a particular problem with the formalist hegemony in literary studies. The problems are framed in terms of three assumptions that the discipline takes for granted, presented as: form is what makes literature distinctive; the history relevant to literary criticism is the history of form; and aesthetic experience is a property of form. Fessenbecker addresses each of these assumptions by first providing a literary theoretical argument that promotes an alternative approach (Chapters 1, 3, and 5) and then exemplifying that approach by literary critical practice on the novels of Anthony Trollope (Chapter 2) and George Eliot (Chapter 4) and the poetry of Robert Browning and Augusta Webster (Chapter 6). (shrink)

Drawing from Nietzsche, I explore the topic of aesthetic education. Even though Nietzsche never formally uses the term “aesthetic education” in his works, this is a novel initiative of my own doing based on what I think he would have to say on the topic. Just as Nietzsche adopted his own experimental approach or style, in a sense, my intention is to experiment with a narrative, which takes the form of a fictional dialogue between Nietzsche and a student. To make (...) sense of what Nietzsche has to say on the topic, I examine certain aspects of his thought as they relate to art, aesthetics, creative activity, creativity, the important role of Bildung (self-cultivation), and other associated areas of interest. This essay critically discusses and analyzes the narrative in relation to Nietzsche's appropriation of the mythical figure of Dionysus, as well as the tragic wisdom it is supposed to incarnate. As such, I argue that Dionysian wisdom is an exposition of the paradoxical characteristics of the creative life that has significant ramifications for aesthetic education. (shrink)

This article explores the question of how the members of the Lvov-Warsaw School promoted values that can be regarded as components of so-called logical culture. The author argues that these values are strictly connected with science. With references to Łukasiewicz, Czeżowski, and Kotarbiński,the article explores how values shape the logical culture and determines society as directed towards values. The article connects the meta-philosophical perspective with the philosophical one.

In his presidential address, at the fiftieth anniversary of the American Society of Aesthetics in 1992, Peter Kivy suggested that "progress in the philosophy of art in the immediate future is to be made not by theorizing in the grand manner, but by careful and imaginative philosophical scrutiny of the individual arts and their individual problems." The study of the individual arts, and the differences between them, has, in the ensuing decades, provided a useful corrective to aesthetic theorizing in the (...) grand manner. In this essay, I urge philosophers of art, art educators, and art theorists to consider a different option—the rigorous and creative investigation of art clusters: that is, various collections of artworks and art kinds, unified by significant similarities and cutting across the recognized artforms and genres. (shrink)

In this paper I draw from Husserl’s lectures on ethics and manuscripts on phantasy to clarify the role and the structure of aesthetic education within a phenomenological theory of value experience. First, I show that Husserl’s take on emotions as material contents of value experiences involves the problem of justifying the validity of the relation between factual emotional states and ideal values. I then suggest, on the basis of some of Husserl’s phenomenological arguments on phantasy, that this discrepancy can be (...) bridged through the enjoyment of art – that is, through a process of aesthetic education. I will focus, as Husserl does, on theatrical art as a case study. My aim is to support the claim that artistic phantasy offers us the possibility of an education of emotions by helping us to progressively explore the eidetic structure of emotional states in their individuality, but regardless of their isolated here and now (that is, of their factual occasionality). The first part of the argument refers mainly to the last chapters of Husserl’s Einleitung in die Ethik (1920/1924). The second part focuses on a 1918 manuscript. I conclude by hinting at how the idea of a phenomenological aesthetic education could help providing a coherent interpretation of Husserl’s ethics, while also contributing to the ongoing debate about fictional objects. (shrink)

How can imitation lead to free musical expression? This article explores the role of auditory imitation in jazz. Even though many renowned jazz musicians have assessed the method of imitating recorded music, no systematic study has hitherto explored how the method prepares for aural jazz improvisation. The article picks up an assumption presented by Berliner (1994), suggesting that learning jazz by aural imitation is “just like” learning a mother tongue. The article studies three potential stages in the method, comparing with (...) imitative, rhythmic, multimodal, and protosymbolic behavior of infant perception (building on the works of Stern, Trevarthen, and Merleau-Ponty). The demonstrations of the aural-imitation method draw on pedagogic experiences accumulated since 1979 in the Jazz Program at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. By analyzing structures of behavior suggested by the method, the article indicates key traits that render aural jazz improvisation possible, such as a fundamental sense of rhythm, formation of symbolic behavior, joint musical attention, and the facility to “hear via the other.” In conclusion, we critically address a frequent theoretical model describing musical improvisation as a synthesis of discrete elements or building blocks. (shrink)

إن التعلم جوهري للوجود الإنسان ، وأساسي للتربية وهو منطلق أساسي لدراسة علم النفس ولازم لفهم حقيقة العقل البشري. والواقع أنه لم يحظ أي موضوع آخر من موضوعات علم النفس بمثل ما حظي به موضوع التعلم من عمق في البحث والدراسة. ومنذ أن بدأ الاهتمام بدراسة سلوك الإنسان ظل التعلم وقضاياه موضع اهتمام الباحثين والدارسين حتى أن بعض المفكرين أمثال أرسطو والقديس أوغسطين وجون لوك كانوا يعتبرون التعلم قضية رئيسية. كما بلغ الاهتمام بقضايا التعلم ومشكلاته ذروته في أوائل القرن العشرين. (...) فما هو التعلم؟ وماهي أهم نظريات التعلم التي تعتمد عليها المقاربة بالكفايات؟ إن التعلم فعل متواصل ومستمر في حياتنا اليومية في كل جوانبها وميادينها المختلفة٬ سواء في مؤسسات عبر برامج محكمة تسعى لعمليات الضبط الاجتماعي وغيرها من العمليات الأخرى٬ وذلك من خلال محاولة فهم السلوك وترويضه٬ أو داخل أخرى تخضع لمفهوم الضمير الجمعي بما يحكم ذلك من قيم وعادات وتقاليد خارج القولبة البرنماجية٬ والتي تكون فيها التربية أو التنشئة عمودية وفقا لمبدأ الاستبطان وتقليد النماذج السلوكية. ..Brochures Educatives. (shrink)

In this article I aim to show how the sensus communis grounds – with the use of its maxims – the possibility of reflection, endowing the subject with a duty, that of becoming human, where becoming human presupposes self-education. Self-education entails on one hand overcoming one’s self interest or private feelings – that is what an aesthetic judgment demands: To love something other than one-self; on the other hand, and more fundamentally, self-education entails to place one-self under the indeterminate idea (...) of humanity. Like all ideas and ideals of reason, the idea of humanity places an unrealizable demand upon the subject, to become part of an idea, in this case, that of humanity; this demand can never be met. Nevertheless, it is the strive to meat such a demand that motivates the human being to become human. To do so the subject will need to reflect appropriating thus the world through the exercise of its judgment. (shrink)

Spinoza’s concepts of wonder, the imitation of affects, cheerfulness, and devotion provide the basis for a Spinozist aesthetics. Those concepts from his Ethics, when combined with his account of rituals and festivals in the Theological-Political Treatise and his Political Treatise, reveal an aesthetics of social affects. The repetition of ritualised participatory aesthetic practices over time generates a unique ingenium or way of life for a social group, a singular style which distinguishes them from the general political body. Ritual and the (...) imitation of affects explain why specific styles of art are associated with consistent styles of bodily modifications, clothing, and affects. This paper claims, not that already similar people flock to the same art, but rather, that immersion in the same art is what produces their similarity. Art (especially in the immersive, festival-like experience of live performance) can generate the affect of devotion, which intensifies in-group love, temporarily blocks affects of sadness, and focusses one intently on the aesthetic experience due to devotion’s connection to wonder. Cheerfulness shows that, through variation of aesthetic objects, art can cause pleasure without risking excess. In addition, while politics’ central affect is sad fear, aesthetically-united groups are bound by joyful affects. (shrink)

In the 19th century, a gradual reform of art education began, which achieved its peak in the 1930s. This process manifested itself in the form of schools with an explicit anti-academic spirit – the Bauhaus in Europe and Black Mountain College in the United States. In this paper, I contend that such attempt at reform has never repeated again after the Black Mountain College case, where the combination of John Dewey’s educational principles, Josef Albers’ peculiar conception of art instruction, and (...) the college founders’ ideas concerning the essentiality of art for contemporary democratic societies created a unique environment for the development of an experimental form of art education. Examining this innovation with regard to the current situation of teaching art and the humanities, I argue that - despite a process of reform lasted more than a hundred years - art education still manifests residues of the old, conservative academic spirit, while art schools show features of exclusivity or even elitism. The pursuit for a wholesome social position of art, on the other hand, was the most striking endeavour of many brilliant thinkers in 19th and 20th century, something that art educators and art theoreticians of the 21st century must take this into a serious consideration. (shrink)

Enriching Arts Education through Aesthetics examines the use of aesthetic theory as the foundation to design and implement arts activities suitable for integration in school curricula in pre-school and primary school education. This book suggests teaching practices based on the connection between aesthetics and arts education and shows that this kind of integration promotes enriched learning experiences. -/- The book explores how the core ideas of four main aesthetic approaches – the representationalist, the expressionist, the formalist, and the postmodernist – (...) translate into respective ways of designing and implementing experiential aesthetics-based activities. Containing relevant examples of interventions used in classes, it analyzes the ways in which the combination of different aesthetic approaches can support varied, multifaceted, multimodal and balanced teaching situations in school. (shrink)

Against the tendency to regard Müller as a tragedian and his Hamletmaschine as a tragedy, I will read his play as an experiment on the possibility of comedic theater after Brecht. Hamletmaschine can thus be understood as an attempt to affirm the possibilities of theater and its own forms of estrangement without abstracting from tragedy, alienation, and negativity. The play contains three such models internally connecting alienation and affirmation: while “Hamlet” in his commitment to the negativity of a lost tragedy (...) can only affirm it by resigning himself to it, “Ophelia” affirms and enhances negativity to the point of her self-extinction. Finally, the “Scherzo” refers back to these two models and finds a way to celebrate a form of affirmation that proves capable of transforming alienation and tragedy, without leaving them behind. (shrink)

György Alajos Szerdahely, the first professor of aesthetics in Pest, publishes his Aesthetica in 1778, a work, written in Latin, that not only engages with the eclectic university aesthetics of late-18th-century Germany and Central Europe, but also marks the beginning of the Hungarian aesthetic tradition. Szerdahely proposes aesthetics as the doctrine of taste, a philosophical discipline that can polish our manners and social conduct through a sensual-affective Bildung offered by art experiences. Highlighting his sources in both British criticism and German (...) aesthetics, the paper traces the development of Szerdahely's concept of beauty from beauty as form (uniformity amidst variety) to beauty in motion (sensibility). Initially, Szerdahely argues for unity and variety as the two main constituents of a beautiful object, evoking disinterested contemplation, but he then turns to sensibility as the third necessary condition of beauty: an object becomes aesthetically beautiful only if it has the power to strike the senses (Lux) and stir the affections (Vivacitas), enlivening the whole embodied person. The paper argues that this third principle of sensibility proves to be more emphatic than the first two, leading to (1) the aesthetic conception of beauty as an experiential quality; but more interestingly to (2) the incorporation of the element of self-preservation and self-love into aesthetic experience. The reason for the latter development lies in Szerdahely’s anthropological argument, which traces back every affection to the instantaneous apprehension of good or evil concerning ourselves, implying desire (Adpetitus) or aversion (Auersi) in our reactions. (shrink)

This paper first elaborates ‘Art’ and the aesthetic as these concepts emerged in the eighteenth century, and uncovers the conflict between the resulting ideal of ‘art for art’s sake’ and the increasing use ‘art therapy’ for personal and social purposes. Taking this conflict to be a reason for the rejection of ‘Art’, it considers two accounts of ‘the end of Art’, one by Arthur Danto and the other by Nicholas Wolterstorff. The paper argues that both accounts fall short of adequately (...) recognizing the presence of the aesthetic in everyday life, and that once we do acknowledge the properly aesthetic character of ‘Design’, a way of thinking is opened up that can make better sense of art therapy. The paper concludes with a brief indication of where the next philosophical question about art therapy lies. (shrink)

The central objective of Dewey’s Democracy and Education is to explain ‘what is needed to live a meaningful life and how can education contribute?’ While most acquainted with Dewey’s educational philosophy know that ‘experience’ plays a central role, the role of ‘situations’ may be less familiar or understood. This essay explains why ‘situation’ is inseparable from ‘experience’ and deeply important to Democracy and Education’s educational methods and rationales. First, a prefatory section explores how experience is invoked and involved in pedagogical (...) practice, especially experience insofar as it is (a) experimental, (b) direct, and (c) social-moral in character. The second and main section on situations follows. After a brief introduction to Dewey’s special philosophical use of ‘situation’, I examine how situations are implicated in (a) student interest and motivation; (b) ‘aims’ and ‘criteria’ in problem-solving; and (c) moral education (habits, values, and judgements). What should become abundantly clear from these examinations is that there could be no such thing as meaningful education, as Dewey understood it, without educators’ conscious, intentional, and imaginative deployment of experience and situations. (shrink)

This important new book provides an original and compelling argument for a new theory of aesthetic education. Rafe McGregor proposes a model of interdisciplinary inquiry, applying a combined philosophical and critical approach to illuminate issues in a social science. The book makes an original contribution to the field of narrative criminology.

This article addresses a discourse on visual culture and its comparability to visual arts in school curriculum; it focuses initially on Kevin Tavin’s 2005 history of popular and visual culture in relation to visual-art education.1 In the second part, I also discuss contributions to this discourse by Kerry Freedman2 and Paul Duncum.3 There are two concerns that I raise here about arguments made against visual-arts curriculum in this discourse. First, they are generally lacking in rigor, making generalized criticisms of different (...) writers from different sources, in an effort to describe a coherent new discipline that circulates around different names, such as “visual culture,” “popular culture,” “visual literacy,” and... (shrink)

The importance of this article for society lies in its exploration of the intersection between ethics and aesthetics as a foundation for quality education. In today's rapidly evolving and complex world, there is a pressing need to cultivate individuals who are not only knowledgeable but also ethically conscious and culturally sensitive. By integrating ethical and aesthetic considerations into educational practices, this article advocates for a holistic approach that fosters the full development of human personality and promotes a culture of peace. (...) Such an interdisciplinary approach to education can inspire both personal growth and social responsibility. It encourages the development of critical thinking, moral discernment, and a deeper appreciation for cultural diversity. As societies become increasingly interconnected, the ability to navigate ethical and aesthetic dimensions becomes crucial in nurturing well-rounded individuals capable of contributing positively to their communities and beyond. Ultimately, the insights presented in this article aim to reshape educational paradigms, making them more relevant and impactful in addressing the challenges of our time. (shrink)

The importance of this article for society lies in its exploration of the intersection between ethics and aesthetics as a foundation for quality education. In today's rapidly evolving and complex world, there is a pressing need to cultivate individuals who are not only knowledgeable but also ethically conscious and culturally sensitive. By integrating ethical and aesthetic considerations into educational practices, this article advocates for a holistic approach that fosters the full development of human personality and promotes a culture of peace. (...) Such an interdisciplinary approach to education can inspire both personal growth and social responsibility. It encourages the development of critical thinking, moral discernment, and a deeper appreciation for cultural diversity. As societies become increasingly interconnected, the ability to navigate ethical and aesthetic dimensions becomes crucial in nurturing well-rounded individuals capable of contributing positively to their communities and beyond. Ultimately, the insights presented in this article aim to reshape educational paradigms, making them more relevant and impactful in addressing the challenges of our time. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to examine how different aspects of aesthetic theory can be utilized in education so as to contribute to a workable, coherent, and multifaceted arts integration approach in elementary education. The authors begin by presenting specific aspects of aesthetic theory as indicative of the basic theoretical and philosophical approaches to the phenomenon of art. They then refer to examples of activities designed on the basis of these different aesthetic aspects, and finally, they present the findings (...) that came out of these activities’ pilot implementations in preschool and school classrooms. Based on the methodological analysis of these implementations, the authors examine the benefits of the activities deriving from each of the different aspects of aesthetic theory; how they differ depending on the aspect from which they arise; and how the implementation of these types of activities as multi-theoretical sets can reveal a new way to design a coherent and multifaceted arts integration curriculum. What the authors attempt to do is show that the variety of approaches to the definition of art and the analysis of aesthetics can be the touchstones for organizing arts integration in elementary education. (shrink)

Christian B. Miller has noted a “realism challenge” for virtue ethicists to provide an account of how the character gap between virtuous agents and non-virtuous agents can be bridged. This is precisely one of Han Feizi’s key criticisms against Confucian virtue ethics, as Eric L. Hutton argues, which also cuts across the Aristotelian one: appealing to virtuous agents as ethical models provides the wrong kind of guidance for the development of virtues. Hutton, however, without going into detail, notes that the (...) notion of rituals in the Confucian tradition may be able to sidestep Han Feizi’s criticism. In this essay, I wish to explore not only how the notion of rituals, alongside its corollaries in Xunzi’s Confucian program for ethical cultivation, indeed addresses Han Feizi’s criticism, but also observe that Aristotle’s tragic poetry plays functionally equivalent roles in his own understanding of ethical upbringing. I will begin by considering Han Feizi’s critique of ethical cultivation in virtue ethics as such and how it poses a specific problem for the acquisition of the ‘constitutive reasoning’ shared by Aristotle and Xunzi. I will then briefly note that this problem trades on the synthetic structure of human nature found in both Aristotle and Xunzi (the rational/irrational parts of the soul and the heartmind/five faculties), which grounds the way they understand ethical action and agency. Finally, I will suggest how both Aristotle and Xunzi understand the role of the arts in their extensive programme of ethical cultivation, allowing them to respond to Han Feizi’s attack as too narrow a construal of their respective ethical projects. It is hoped that, through this, we may gain a better sense of how more recent virtue ethicists may similarly draw on aesthetic resources for ethical development. (shrink)

الإحساس بالجمال خاصیة إنسانیة، وهو من عجائب النفس البشریة التي لا تستطیع تفسیرها، وإنما تشعر بها وتحسها، وتقع تحت سلطان تأثیرها ونفوذها الواسع، فكون التذوق الجمالي یخفف من إیقاع المادیة على النفس الإنسانیة، ویفتح لها مجالا خصبا للتعبیر عن شعورها وإحساسها، فإنه مع ذلك حاجة فطریة ضروریة على وجه العموم، والإنسان یستشعر الجمال بلذة ورضى حتى و إن لم یكن مالكا له؛ لأن القلوب مطبوعة على حب الصور الحسنه المتقنة، ومازال الإنسان یبذل غالب جهده العلمي وقدراته المتفوقة في التحسین والإبداع (...) الجمالي. أما التربیة الجمالیة فتحظى باهتمام كبير في الأوساط التربویة؛ إذ أصبحت مطلبا أساسيا في البرامج والمناهج التعلیمیة؛ نظرا لأهمیتها البالغة في النمو المتكامل للشخصیة بمختلف جوانبها المعرفية والعقلیة والجسدیة والانفعالیة....، لأن هذا النوع من التربية يعد العامل الأكثر تأثیرا في صقل التذوق الجمالي الموجود عند كل فرد، والذي یملك القابلیة التامة للنمو والتدریب والتهذیب؛ لذلك یمكن البدایة مع الطفل منذ مراحله العمریة الأولى، فرعایة النشء لتذوق الجمال، أو العیش في كنفه وخلق ظروفه بالوسائل الجمالیة الطبیعیة والفنیة یجب التخطیط لها وإدراجها في سلم أولویات تعاملنا مع الأطفال. إن الحاجة إلى التربية الجمالية بالمدرسة تمليها عدة اعتبارات، أولا، هذه التربية تستهدف الشخصية في أبعادها المتنوعة لتنمي لديها الإحساس بالجمال، والقدرة على إعمال الخيال والنزوع المستمر نحو الإبداع والابتكار. ثانيا، أنها تتعلق بعمليات الإبداع والتذوق الفني، والتي ترتبط بدورها بعمليات الإدراك والتصور، والتفكير والتصرف لدى الإنسان عامة والطفل خاصة. إنها تربية تتعلق بصميم الإنسان. ثالثا، أن التربية الجمالية مشروع شامل ومتكامل، تصب فيه التربية على المسرح، والتربية الموسيقية، والتربية التشكيلية، والتربية السينمائية...، وكلها روافد تتقاطع في مقصد أساسي هو تنمية الشخصية وصقل مواهبها بكل مكوناتها. فما التربية الجمالية؟ وما هي روافدها وأسسها؟ وأين تتجلى الحاجة لهذه التربية؟ . (shrink)

هو العلامة فريد بن الحسن الأنصاري الخزرجي السجلماسي، ولد بإقليم الرشيدية (أنيف) عام1380 ه/1960م ، قضى طفولته بمدينة الجرف، وبها تلقى تعليمه الابتدائي، وتابع تعليمه الإعدادي بمدينة أرفود، قبل أن ينتقل إلى مدينة كلميمة لإتمام دراسته بالتعليم الثانوي ، وكان ذلك بثانوية غريس واسمها اليوم ثانوية محمد الخامس التأهيلية. التحق سنة 1981 بشعبة الدراسات الإسلامية، بكلية الآداب والعلوم الإنسانية ظهر المهراز بفاس، وهي يومئذ شعبة حديثة فتية، إذ لم يمر على تأسيسها إلا موسما واحدا. وبعد حصوله على الإجازة التحق بما (...) كان يسمى "سلك تكوين المكونين"، حيث تخرج أستاذا جامعيا، اشتغل في البداية بكلية الآداب والعلوم الإنسانية بالمحمدية في الفترة (1987_ 1994)، ثم انتقل إلى كلية الآداب والعلوم الإنسانية بمكناس، وهنا بدأت رسالته التربوية تزدهر وتتنوع وتلقي بثمراتها على كل المؤسسات (مساجد، جمعيات، ملتقيات، مناسبات...).  حاصل على دكتوراه الدولة في الدراسـات الإسـلامية، تخصص أصول الفقه، من جامعة الحسن الثاني كلية الآداب بالمحمدية.  حاصل على دبلوم الدراسات العليا، تخصص أصول الفقه من جامعة محمد الخامس، كلية الآداب، الرباط.  حاصل على دبلوم الدراسات الجامعية العليا (نظام تكوين المكونين)، الماجستير في الدراسات الإسلامية، ¬ من جامعة محمد الخامس، كلية الآداب، -الرباط.  عضو المجلس العلمي الأعلى.  رئيس المجلس العلمي المحلي، مكناس.  عضو مؤسس لمعهد الدراسات المصطلحية، التابع لكلية الآداب والعلوم الإنسانية بجامعة محمد بن عبد الله، فاس.  عضو رابطة الأدب الإسلامي العالمية.  رئيس سابق لشعبة الدراسات الإسلامية بكلية الآداب، جامعة مولاي إسماعيل بمكناس.  أستاذ زائر بدار الحديث الحسنية للدراسات الإسلامية العليا بالرباط.  أستاذ بمركز تكوين الأئمة والمرشدات بوزارة الأوقاف والشؤون الإسلامية بالرباط.  رئيس وحدة "الفتوى والمجتمع ومقاصد الشريعة" بكلية الآداب بمكناس.  رئيس وحدة الدكتوراه: "الاجتهاد المقاصدي: التاريخ والمنهج"، بكلية الآداب بمكناس، وهي أول وحدة للدكتوراه في شعبة الدراسات الإسلامية بالكلية.  أستاذ الفقه وأصوله ومقاصد الشريعة بكلية الآداب بمكناس.  أستاذ كرسي التفسير بالجامع العتيق لمدينة مكناس. . Revue Brochures Educatives مجلة كراسات تربوية (2018). (shrink)

It can hardly be denied that play is an important tool for the development and socialisation of children. In this article we argue that, through dramaturgical play in combination with pedagogical tools such as the Community of Inquiry (CoI), in the tradition of Philosophy for Children (P4C), students can creatively think, reflect and be more aware of the impact their gestures (Schmid 2000b) have on others. One of the most fundamental aspects of the embodied human life is human interaction that (...) is based on expressions, what Schmid calls gestures. Through self-reflection, one’s set of gestures can be developed into a deliberate ‘life-performance’; a conscious, selected and coherent work of art (Schmid, 2000b, p. 332). Drawing on Nietzsche’s idea of living artistically, we explore how Schmid’s philosophy of the art of living, P4C and the liberal arts, with a focus on drama education, can work together to develop (self-) reflective, reasonable citizens who are able to develop their own art of living while respecting and supporting the development of the good and beautiful life of others. (shrink)