Aesthetics
Academic Year 2024/2025 - Teacher: CHIARA MILITELLOExpected Learning Outcomes
This
course explores the history of aesthetic to the present day. The course is
designed to provide students with an introduction to the discipline of
aesthetics and philosophy of art, with particular reference to the historical
development of the subject and its relation to the arts, literature, music,
cinema and photography. At the end of the course, students are expected to demonstrate
an understanding of basic concepts and methods of aesthetics and philosophy of
art. Students will gain an understanding of the nature of beauty, art, and philosophy;
they will also be introduced to the central questions of aesthetics.
Course Structure
The
teaching will be carried out through lectures, a method that will ensure the
transmission of contents and methods. In order to achieve the objectives
relating to learning and communication skills, questions for clarification and
deepening by the students will be encouraged during the lessons.
Required Prerequisites
No
prior knowledge is required.
Attendance of Lessons
Class
attendance is strongly recommended, because the exposition of philosophical theories
by the professor greatly facilitates the acquisition of the contents by the
students.
Detailed Course Content
The
aesthetic experience. Aesthetic evaluation. The relationships between
aesthetics and literary and artistic criticism.
The
criteria underlying poetic production. Passions and poetry. The science of
verisimilitude. Mimesis. Catharsis. The capacity of the poetic word to arouse
strong feelings.
Textbook Information
1. Paolo D’Angelo, Estetica, Laterza 2011, ISBN 9788842096061, 244 pp.
2. Aristotle, Poetics, translated with an introduction and notes by Malcolm Heath, Penguin Classics 2003, 144 pp.
2. Aristotle, Poetics, translated with an introduction and notes by Malcolm Heath, Penguin Classics 2003, 144 pp.
| Author | Title | Publisher | Year | ISBN |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paolo D’Angelo | Estetica | Laterza | 2011 | 9788842096061 |
| Aristotele | Retorica e Poetica | UTET | 2015 | 9788851134051 |
Course Planning
| Subjects | Text References | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The definition of aesthetics | 1 (chapter 1) |
| 2 | Aesthetic predicates | 1 (chapter 2) |
| 3 | Aesthetic evaluation | 1 (chapter 3) |
| 4 | The aesthetic experience | 1 (chapter 4) |
| 5 | The origin of art | 1 (chapter 5) |
| 6 | Subjectivity, objectivity, intersubjectivity of aesthetic judgment | 1 (chapter 6) |
| 7 | Aesthetics as a theory of beauty and its modern overcoming | 1 (chapter 7) |
| 8 | Ontology of art | 1 (chapter 8) |
| 9 | The classification of the arts | 1 (chapter 9) |
| 10 | Autonomy and heteronomy of art | 1 (chapter 10) |
| 11 | The future of art | 1 (chapter 11) |
| 12 | The context of Aristotle's Poetics | 2 (introduction chapter 1) |
| 13 | Poetry and imitation | 2 (introduction chapters 2 and 3) |
| 14 | Tragedy | 2 (introduction chapthers 4 to 10) |
| 15 | Epic poetry | 2 (introduction chapter 11) |
| 16 | Types of imitative poetry | 2 (introduction chapter 12, text chapters 1 to 5) |
| 17 | Definition of tragedy | 2 (text chapters 6 to 22) |
| 18 | Rules of epic poetry | 2 (text chapters 23 to 24) |
| 19 | Possible criticisms of epic poetry and tragedy | 2 (text chapter 25) |
| 20 | Superiority of tragedy over epic poetry | 2 (text chapter 26) |
Learning Assessment
Learning Assessment Procedures
Oral
examination, assessed on the basis of the following elements: relevance of the
answers to the questions asked (necessary to pass the exam); content quality,
ability to connect the various parts of the course, proper philosophical
language, overall expressive skills (all these elements contribute to the final
evaluation, provided that the answers are relevant).
Examples of frequently asked questions and / or exercises
In what sense is the aesthetic experience always an experience of choice?
In what sense is art autonomous?
In what sense is art autonomous?
What are the differences between aesthetic experience and other types of experience?
What ontological status do Goodman and Kivy attribute to ‘types’?
The notions of imagination and image in Plato.
Read this passage from Aristotle's Poetics and explain its meaning, contextualising it within the work.