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From Defining Art to Defining the Individual Arts: The Role of Theory in the Philosophies of Arts

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Book cover New Waves in Aesthetics

Part of the book series: New Waves in Philosophy ((NWIP))

Abstract

What is the definition of art? Not too long ago, this might have been properly said to be the central issue in philosophical aesthetics. Not anymore.1 But philosophers of art are unlikely to give up on the pursuit of definition that easily. Most of us have invested far too much time and energy learning how to go about the game of definition and counterexample to simply let it go just like that. Might there not be some other questions of definition that could structure the field in this new century? What, after all, is a comic book? Or a film? Or a poem? Or a dance? Perhaps if we pursued definitions of the individual arts or art forms we might get somewhere. In this essay, I shall offer some sceptical thoughts about that pursuit—sceptical thoughts inspired by the paper that inadvertently triggered interest for more than five decades in the definition of art, namely, Morris Weitz’s ‘The Role of Theory in Aesthetics’.

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Authors
  1. Aaron Meskin
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Sussex, UK

    Kathleen Stock (Senior Lecturer in Philosophy) (Senior Lecturer in Philosophy)

  2. Oberlin College, USA

    Katherine Thomson-Jones (assistant professor) (assistant professor)

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© 2008 Aaron Meskin

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Meskin, A. (2008). From Defining Art to Defining the Individual Arts: The Role of Theory in the Philosophies of Arts. In: Stock, K., Thomson-Jones, K. (eds) New Waves in Aesthetics. New Waves in Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230227453_7

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