Site • RSS • Apple PodcastsDescription (podcaster-provided):
Lecture series on Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art. The first part of the series focuses on some of the most important writings on art and beauty in the Western philosophical tradition, covering Plato, Aristotle, David Hume, and Immanuel Kant. The second part of the series focuses on questions about understanding works of art and about the nature of art. This part examines the interpretation of literature, the expression of emotion in music, and the definition of artThemes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):
➤ Western aesthetics classics: Plato, Aristotle, Hume, Kant • beauty, taste, aesthetic judgment • interpreting literature • emotional expression in music • philosophical questions about art’s nature and definitionThis podcast presents a lecture series on aesthetics and the philosophy of art, taught from the perspective of the Western philosophical tradition and then extended into contemporary questions about how art works and what counts as art. The early portion concentrates on major historical texts and arguments about beauty, artistic value, and taste, drawing on key figures such as Plato and Aristotle and then moving through early modern and Enlightenment debates, including Hume’s attempt to explain how judgments of taste can aspire to standards despite their apparent subjectivity. Substantial attention is given to Kant’s account of aesthetic judgment, exploring how judgments of beauty relate to pleasure, universality, and the distinctive kind of evaluation involved in aesthetic experience.
Building on these foundations, the series shifts to problems central to philosophical aesthetics today: how to understand and interpret artworks, how meaning is conveyed, and what distinguishes art from non-art. It examines interpretive questions in literature, including how readers should approach authorial intention, textual meaning, and the role of context in making sense of a work. It also addresses music as a case study for debates about expression, focusing on how music can seem to express or evoke emotions and what that implies about the relationship between artistic form and human feeling. The series culminates in a treatment of the problem of defining art, considering what kinds of criteria—historical, institutional, functional, or formal—might plausibly capture the category of art and how philosophical definitions connect to actual artistic practice. Overall, the content is structured as a coherent course that combines close engagement with canonical philosophers and focused analysis of interpretive and definitional issues across different art forms.
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8. Defining Art 2011-Mar-15 52 minutes |
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7. Musical Expression 2011-Mar-15 52 minutes |
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6. Literary Interpretation 2011-Mar-15 54 minutes |
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5. Kant's Critique of Judgement: Lecture 2 2011-Mar-15 53 minutes |
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4. Kant's Critique of Judgement: Lecture 1 2011-Mar-15 55 minutes |
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3. Hume and the Standard of Taste 2011-Mar-15 55 minutes |
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2. Aristotle's Poetics 2011-Mar-15 55 minutes |
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1. Plato's Philosophy of Art 2011-Mar-15 54 minutes |