CPES 2008
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CPES paper

 

 

 

Teaching the Ineffable:

Ethics and Aesthetics

In

Art and Literature

Susan Barber and Jan MacLean,

SFU

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Aesthetics, Ethics & Literature

TEACHING ETHICALLY AND AESTHETICALLY:

FACILITATING EXPERIENCES THAT GO BEYOND ARTICULATION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wittgenstein: "That which cannot be said must be left in silence."

Yet, art is able to extend understanding where words fall short.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Literature :

Uses sensuous language to appeal to memory and emotions

Focuses on deep experience

Enters the consciousness of other people, achieving a rare intimacy

Can overwhelm us with thoughts and feelings, sometimes called the "ineffable"

Manages this effect because the whole is greater than its parts; feeling and thought converge to draw on reserves of unspoken knowledge.

Murdoch calls it "cognition in another mode"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Aesthetic Experience

When we can open ourselves to this imaginative state, we break out of our daily existence.

 

Teaching literature with aesthetics in mind enables students to develop as human beings and to understand more of life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Ethics in Reading

 

In literature, various moral conflicts are to be found

Aristotle: rules of morality are not easily applied in real life with its complexities

Nussbaum: reading exercises one’s moral imagination

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aesthetics in the Reader

As the author writes, she discovers what is there. The author hopes to recreate this experience and share it with the reader.

If the author has done her job, through appealing to the emotions, memory and imagination, then the reader may learn what it is like to live in the shoes of a character quite different from himself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Ethics

of

Teaching

Aesthetically

The   Controversy:

Literary theory/Postmodernism   -or-     Aesthetics ?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Methodology

First, let students experience the literature for themselves. Just as literature "shows" and doesn’t "tell", teachers should also want to avoid telling students what to think.

Second, expose students to other people’s responses, ideally their peers’. Discussion of the text is critical.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Defending Aesthetics in Terms of Ethics to the Postmodernists and Instrumentalists

Postmodernists: Much literature, especially that found in the Western canon, perpetuates the views of the ruling class European white males, and their authoritarian ‘grand narratives"continue to marginalize most other groups.

Today, teachers choose literature carefully to reflect the make-up of their classes and society in general, and much high quality multicultural literature is available.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Instrumentalist view: students need to read with an awareness of a text’s flaws; for example, sexism or racism.

It is true that many older texts have attitudes that differ from ours today, but ‘red flags’ will go up while the students read. If not, they will arise in discussions, or, the teacher can guide students to these discrepancies.

Often these ‘red flags’ become the basis for worthwhile discussions for everyone in the classroom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teaching aesthetically remains controversial but I still feel it is the method that most respects the learner.  No two students will respond alike to a work of literature and each should be validated.

Discussions take the role of putting a work in perspective and widening ideas to include ethics. 

This permits literature to function at what it does best: to help us understand who we are and what it is to be human.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conclusion

This is the nexus where ethics and aesthetics meet education.

Questions between concepts and praxis:

What does an aesthetic experience look like in the classroom?

How do the arts go beyond language?

What value does this have for the students?