{"title":"Dewey, Foucault, and the Value of Horror: Transformative Learning through Reading Horror Fiction","authors":"Lorraine K. C. Yeung","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0075","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0075","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article advances an account of the nonhedonic values of horror fiction (including film). It is motivated by cases in which consuming horror fosters what theorists of education call \"transformative learning\" in adult students, brought to my attention through teaching a course titled \"Horror Film and Fiction.\" Transformative learning refers to the process by which students' critical consciousness is activated in a way that they examine, question, and revise certain existing perceptions shaped by their experiences. The process is more a shocking and disturbing experience than pleasurable. In this article, I focus on two cases in which two students underwent such a transformation on studying Roman Polanksi's Repulsion (1968) and Tod Browning's Freaks (1932), respectively. In the first case, the student's experience of madness is modified, while, in the second, the student's experience of abnormality is disrupted. To give the transformation in question a philosophical underpinning, I draw on Dewey's concept of \"aesthetic experience\" in Art as Experience, Foucault's concept of \"experience book,\" and O'Leary's approach to the value of fiction developed in his Foucault and Fiction and contend that the works of horror effectuated what O'Leary calls \"transformative experience\" in the students. In the second half of the paper, I extend my account beyond the classroom context by offering a close reading of Robert Bloch's Psycho (1959), with the aim of demonstrating that it has the potential to transform the everyday experience of madness of the American readers in Bloch's times, and probably the experience of normality of the worldwide readers thereafter.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"75 - 93"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45304478","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Developing Aesthetic Taste","authors":"D. Fenner","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0113","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0113","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This paper explores how facts that lie beyond the formal properties of works of art are necessary for the development of aesthetic taste. The paper argues that taste may be educated, that an educated taste is better than a noneducated one, and that this education proceeds largely along the lines of learning contextual facts relevant to the appreciation of individual objects (and events), as well as ones relevant to genres and artforms. The paper offers arguments against the proposal that different tastes are incommensurable one with another. The paper begins with a comparison between considering a work of literature as literature or as simply calligraphy and in exploring what makes those two events different finds that the learning of the sorts of facts mentioned above are generally necessary for the development of taste.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"113 - 122"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43512994","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Art across Cultures and Art by Appropriation","authors":"Mark Lafrenz","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.2.0001","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Art, broadly understood, exists across cultures, and non-art objects can become works of art through acts of creative appropriation. Appropriators can be artists. A correct concept or definition of art will be adequate insofar as it tracks the metaphysics of art in general. Among the conditions something must meet to be a member of the class of artworks is that it was created with the intention that it serve a certain cultural role by which it represents or otherwise conveys meaning(s) or has assumed that role over time. It is an objective matter whether something is a work of art whatever conditions allowed for its creation and whatever meaning(s) it represents or otherwise conveys.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"1 - 20"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48231456","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Abject in Education","authors":"Cassie Lowe","doi":"10.5406/JAESTEDUC.54.3.0017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/JAESTEDUC.54.3.0017","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This paper explores Julia Kristeva’s theory of abjection and its manifestations in society, culture, and discourse. It makes specific reference to the effects of social abjection on women with regard to menstruation, but the claims and proposal could very well be adapted to apply to other marginalized members of society. It uses Hillel A. Schiller’s suggestion for viewing education as a “cognetic process” to frame the discussion on embedding discussions of the abject into the curriculum. It first explores and sets the foundations for the theory of abjection, as described by Kristeva, and discusses the “cognetic process” in relation to social abjection. Finally, it suggests that an appreciation of an aesthetic educational experience could be viewed as a step toward lessening the effects of social abjection and work toward its reconfiguration.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"17 - 30"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41446049","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Introduction to the Narrative Justice Symposium","authors":"R. McGregor","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.4.0001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.4.0001","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Narrative Justice presents an argument for a contemporary theory of aesthetic education, followed by examples of that theory in practice. I use aesthetic education in its strict philosophical sense, that is, as a thesis about the relationship between aesthetic or artistic value on the one hand and moral and political value on the other hand. The crux of the thesis is that there is some kind of causal relation between aesthetic experiences and moral development. The term is ambiguous because an aesthetic education is not an education in aesthetics but an education by aesthetics, specifically a moral education by aesthetic means, which is, in turn, a means to the end of political education.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"1 - 5"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-02-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46558026","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Bearing Witness to a Knowledge of Encounter in Babette’s Feast","authors":"Rebecca Sullivan","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0069","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0069","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:The 1987 film Babette’s Feast portrays the transformation of a community through its participation in an artfully crafted meal. In this article, I seek to illuminate the educational significance of this transformation by considering Babette’s person and role through David Hansen’s reflective posture of bearing witness. I propose that the power of Babette’s teaching springs from her embodied understanding of the relationship between the self, others, and the environment in learning. Through her patient, thoughtful work, Babette inspires each guest to embrace a deeper understanding of themselves and their place within a world of others. I further reflect on the role of bearing witness for enabling and articulating a pedagogy like Babette’s.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"69 - 89"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46751591","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Is It a Forgery? Ask a Semanticist","authors":"William Casement","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0051","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0051","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Forgery is a commonly, if uncomfortably, recognized force in the art world. It might be assumed, then, that the meaning of the term forgery is uniformly established. That assumption would be a mistake. Although forgery in general parlance has a basic, easily understood meaning, specialists of various stripes employ the term in restricted ways that bear the potential for confusion not only among the cognoscenti but for the broader public. In particular, legal terminology often avoids the term forgery altogether in regard to artworks, and several competing and incompatible versions of the difference between a forgery and a “fake” are in circulation in books, on web-sites, and in the literature of certain professional groups. Differentiating forgeries from fakes makes for an exercise in semantics that, while sometimes offering helpful explications, on the whole bodes difficulty. In our age of increasingly shared information, it is possible to inform members of limited groups, as well as other people taking an interest in their activities, about the specific meaning of forgery that is employed by a group. The result can be a helpful understanding for insiders. However, when restricted meanings are presented as if they are general meanings and they conflict with established language, confusion is imminent, and rectifying it is difficult if even possible.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"51 - 68"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42615906","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From Sacrifice to Gift: Aesthetic and Moral Aspects of the Experience of Awe for the Natural Environment","authors":"Ionut Untea","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0018","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0018","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Writing about the ethics and aesthetics of the natural environment, authors like Berleant, Plumwood, Becker, Gschwandtner, Brady, and Scruton share a number of insights with historians of religions (Mauss, Otto, Eliade) over the connection between humanity and nature. These insights are the attention given to human awe in the face of majestic landscapes, a distinctive agency operating through nature’s intentionalities, the sacred character given to this agency of nature, and a feeling of guilt for human destiny diverging from nature’s path or for trespassing the limits humanly imposed that separate the space of artificial human dwelling from natural environment. I argue that reflecting on the awe of the archaic human mind, in the form of both tremendous fear and positive fascination for the mystery of nature, has potential for a contemporary aesthetic and ethical perspective of a symbiotic approach regarding nature’s fate in the context of a human technological destiny.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"18 - 34"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43284180","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Begetting the New: The Marrow of Originality as Discovered from the Making of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet Part 1. Retracing the Antecedents","authors":"A. Petrosyan","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0101","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"101 - 118"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45643394","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Intersecting Compositional and Transactional Theory: How Art Can Help Define Reader Response","authors":"Nina R. Schoonover","doi":"10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0090","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5406/jaesteduc.54.1.0090","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This paper attempts to explain transactional reader-response theory and its critiques using metaphor and composition to capture some of the vast and complex processes occurring in readers’ minds. The belief is that our understanding of literature is shaped through image and form, thus the need to pull from compositional theory to explain the mental processes of transactional theory. For this paper, four separate compositions were created to reflect an individual interpretation of efferent, expressive, aesthetic, and critical responses to literature, responses outlined by Rosenblatt and her critics. This paper aims to provide teachers and scholars with an overview of how artistic representation can help explain the dynamic process of reader response and encourage teachers to recognize these complexities occurring in their students’ minds.","PeriodicalId":45866,"journal":{"name":"JOURNAL OF AESTHETIC EDUCATION","volume":"54 1","pages":"100 - 90"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2020-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42178281","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}