The last Philosophy in the Library talk of 2019 is coming up on December 4th at 7:00 PM! Sebastian Purcell is talking about “Good Habits Aren’t Enough: The Aztec Conception of Shared Agency!” If you’re into indigenous philosophy, the history of philosophy, virtue ethics, or collective action, you should enjoy it.
Brooklyn Public Philosophers is a forum for philosophers in the greater Brooklyn area to discuss their work with a general audience, hosted by the Brooklyn Public Library. Its goal is to raise awareness of the best work on philosophical questions of interest to Brooklynites, and to provide a civil space where Brooklynites can reason together about the philosophical questions that matter to them.
10/23 – Philosophy in the Library: Jennifer Morton on Education @ the Brooklyn Public Library’s Information Commons Lab // 7:30-9:00 PM
11/6 – Philosophy in the Library: Asia Ferrin on Mindfulness @ the Brooklyn Public Library’s Information Commons Lab // 7:30-9:00 PM
12/4 – Philosophy in the Library: Sebastian Purcell on Aztec Philosophy @ the Brooklyn Public Library’s Information Commons Lab // 7:00-9:00 PM
We have a fun (and free, as always) event tonight at 7:00 PM at Black Spring Books in Williamsburg! It’s a discussion of the life of the mind in fiction and philosophy with the philosopher Skye Cleary (How to Be Authentic), the novelist Christine Smallwood (The Life of the Mind), and the novelist-physician-neurologist Melodie Winawer (Anticipation). If you’re interested in what intellectual life means, the drama of ideas, and the relationship between philosophy and literature, this one’s for you. If you can’t make it in person, it will also be livestreamed here.
The philosophy of art, as practiced in the western world, has tended to have two divided homes: in analytic philosophy and continental philosophy. Within the analytic tradition, the philosophy of art has recently undergone a revival with the emphasis on perception. This has more closely aligned art theory to science and questions of biology as well as to issues within psychology. The continental tradition has traditionally drawn upon phenomenology’s first-person experience with its ties to embodied perception as well as the social and historical concerns of the social aspect of art. In the realm itself of visual art, the state of (so-called) post-post modernism has resulted in both the dissolution of belief in progress and even, according to some art critics, a lamentable stagnation. But many philosophers of the last century, beginning with Walter Benjamin, Adorno, Nelson Goodman, etc., have suggested that art needs to be thought of within its social, pragmatic, or epistemological functions, suggesting perhaps a need to think of art outside the confines of modernism’s stylistic revolutions and formalist issues. Relatedly, the pluralism within science could be accessed as model for this enterprise. Multiple views on a phenomenon are required due to the complexity of the enterprise, and the practice of both making art and of perceiving it might be in that category. This conference seeks to bring these strands, the analytical and the continental ones, together and evaluate how to move forward with art theory in an age of globalization.
We welcome submissions on these possible questions:
1. Should we value a diversity of perspectives in art theory? If so, what is the value? If not, why not?
2. Are there aspects of art that we presume to be universal that are, in fact, culturally situated?
3. How should different ways of experiencing art be characterized?
4. What is the epistemological function of art?
5. How does the monetary role in art affect both the artist and the perceiver of art?
6. How do the mechanics of seeing (e.g., gist perception, peripheral vision, etc.) affect how we experience art?
7. How does the practice of making art relate to the first-person experience?
8. What role does Husserl’s “bracketing” have in the viewing or making of art?
9. Are there specific non-western traditions that provide a better explanatory solution for the role of art than have the competing paradigms of continental and analytic?
We welcome your participation and look forward to your contributions. Papers should not extend over 45 minutes. Q & A are 15 minutes.
To submit anonymized abstract BY JULY 15, 2024: papers: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe5c9bmoBYb3hCAb0YWWfzV0BLWbhig2PD5VeKU358VA3RKGw/viewform?usp=sf_link