Roberta Dreon - Richard Shusterman is one of the leading figures in the current field of pragmatist aesthetics and he has undoubtedly played a pivotal role in recovering a pragmatist approach to aesthetics. His book Pragmatist Aesthetics was simultaneously published in France under the title L’Art à l’état vif. La pensée pragmatiste et l’esthétique populaire in 1992, paving the way for a long awaited French translation of Dewey’s Art as Experience (Dewey 1989) in 2010 (Dewey 2005/2010), beaut...

The goal of this paper is twofold. First, it examines the pragmatic ramifications of recent research in certain areas of cognitive science (embodied mind theory, extended mind theory). Second, it shows how the Chicago pragmatists (George H. Mead, John Dewey) not only envisioned these findings but also how, within certain strains of cognitive science, their work is explicitly appreciated for important preliminary insights which help us interpret the outcomes of current research. The argumentative line of the paper revolves around Mead’s (...) and Dewey’s treatment of the relation between perception and action. Cognition, in the view of the Chicago pragmatists, is not divisible into atomistic, ontologically disconnected units but rather should be seen as an organic circuit within which stimuli and responses are mutually interdependent phases of an ongoing goal-directed active involvement of the organism in the environmental structures. According to Mead and Dewey, as well as the presently burgeoning branch of cognitive science called the “extended mind theory,” cognition is not something that takes place exclusively in our heads but should be rather seen as an objective relation between organism and the environment. On the background of Mead’s theory of the act (with its four stages – impulse, perception, manipulation, and consummation) the author points to certain surprising similarities between the pragmatists’ treatment of the notion of cognition and ideas recently suggested by defenders of the extended mind theory. (shrink)

The paper proposes an outline of a reconciliatory approach to the perennial controversy between epistemological realism and anti-realism (constructionism). My main conceptual source in explaining this view is the philosophy of pragmatism, more specifically, the epistemological theories of George H. Mead, John Dewey, and also William James’ radical empiricism. First, the paper analyzes the pragmatic treatment of the goal-directedness of action, especially with regard to Mead’s notion of attitudes, and relates it to certain contemporary epistemological theories provided by the cognitive (...) sciences (Maturana, Rizzolatti, Clark). Against this background, the paper presents a philosophical as well as empirical justification of why we should interpret the environment and its objects in terms of possibilities for action. In Mead’s view, the objects and events of our world emerge within stable patterns of organism-environment interactions, which he called “perspectives”. According to pragmatism as well as the aforementioned cognitive scientists, perception and other cognitive processes include not only neural processes in our heads but also the world itself. Elaborating on Mead’s concept of perspectives, the paper argues in favor of the epistemological position called “constructive realism.”. (shrink)

There have been many readings of Mead's work, and this paper proposes yet another: Mead, theorist of the social act. It is argued that Mead's core theory of the social act has been neglected, and that without this theory, the concept of taking the attitude of the other is inexplicable and the contemporary relevance of the concept of the significant symbol is obfuscated. The paper traces the development of the social act out of Dewey's theory of the act. According to (...) Mead, Dewey's theory does not sufficiently account for consciousness. Grappling with this problematic leads Mead to several key ideas, which culminate in his theory of the social act. The social act and taking the attitude of the other are then illustrated by the analysis of a game of football. The interpretation presented has two novel aspects: first, symbolisation arises not simply through self taking the attitude of the other, but through the pairing of this attitude with the complementary attitude in self; second, self is able to take the attitude of the other to the extent that self has in actuality or in imagination previously been in the social position of the other. From this standpoint the key issue is how the attitude of self and other become integrated. New directions for empirical research, aimed at advancing this question are outlined. Finally, the paper shows how the social act can contribute to our contemporary concerns about the nature of the symbolic. (shrink)

This paper aims to map and highlight the diverse heritage of Pragmatism in aesthetics. It argues that pragmatist aesthetics represents an interesting third way of doing aesthetics beyond the analytic philosophy of art and continental aesthetics. It offers a first, provisional sketch of existing research trends in pragmatist aesthetics, such as somaesthetics, environmental aesthetics, everyday aesthetics, and social aesthetics. Furthermore, it identifies some “family resemblances” connecting most pragmatist “relatives” in the field of aesthetics: the idea that (1) aesthetics is broader (...) than the traditional philosophy of art, (2) the criticism of the view of art as constituting an independent realm or an autonomous system, (3) the thesis of a basic continuity between artistic practices and experience “in the raw,” (4) the adoption of a naturalistic yet non-reductive stance, and (5) a broadly socio-political inspiration. (shrink)