Aesthetic Transactions Research Articles

Readers' advisory vs reference: a difference of stance

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to determine how we ought to distinguish between reference and readers' advisory (RA) service, given the latter’s turn toward a whole collection approach. In other words, the paper answers this question: If both reference and RA librarians aim to meet patrons’ information needs and may theoretically do so using the same materials, then how are we to differentiate the two services conceptually?Design/methodology/approachIn this conceptual paper, we posit that we can distinguish between RA and reference using Louise Rosenblatt’s theory of the aesthetic transaction. With this theory in hand, we can redefine the service distinction in terms of the stance – aesthetic or efferent – that the patron expects to take toward the material they seek.FindingsOn our account, the reader’s desired stance becomes a kind of hermeneutical lens through which a library worker may productively evaluate plausible pathways and materials. An aesthetic lens is characteristic of RA; it makes features of potential aesthetic transactions between a particular reader and a particular text (or genre or author’s oeuvre) salient.Originality/valueThe proposed account constitutes a novel application of Rosenblattian response theory, one that grounds and refines the going view that RA’s proper focus is on supporting a particular sort of experience rather than providing particular sorts of texts. This theoretical emendation also better aligns the service distinction with contemporary conceptualizations of RA as a “whole collection” service. Important practical and philosophical implications follow from the new account.

Psychosocial aesthetics and the art of lived experience

This article identifies the distinctive nature of arts-based psychosocial enquiry and practice in a public mental health context, focusing on two projects delivered as part of The Big Anxiety festival, in Sydney, Australia in 2017: ‘Awkward Conversations’, in which one-to-one conversations about anxiety and mental health were offered in experimental aesthetic formats; and ‘Parragirls Past, Present’, a reparative project, culminating in an immersive film production that explored the enduring effects of institutional abuse and trauma and the ways in which traumatic experiences can be refigured to transform their emotional resonance and meaning. Bringing an arts-based enquiry into lived experience into dialogue with psychosocial theory, this article examines the transformative potential of aesthetic transactions and facilitating environments, specifically with regard to understanding the imbrication of lived experience and social settings.

Teaching Global Literature to “Disturb the Waters”: A Case Study

Within this qualitative case study, I describe how a fifth-grade teacher in an affluent and culturally homogenous school attempted to “disturb the waters” through teaching global literature. Framed by transactional theories of response and critical language awareness, I identify three central pedagogical moves that supported disruptions of students’ assumptions and beliefs: (1) inviting students to share their aesthetic transactions, (2) privileging multiple perspectives and genres, and (3) calling attention to language choices as a central line of inquiry. I argue that both transactional and critical approaches to literacy and language are necessary in order to move students beyond disinterested and prejudicial responses to global literature and to challenge commonly held beliefs.

The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan

Research Article| August 01 2018 The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan Fang-chih Irene Yang Fang-chih Irene Yang Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google boundary 2 (2018) 45 (3): 149–172. https://doi.org/10.1215/01903659-6915629 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter Email Permissions Search Site Citation Fang-chih Irene Yang; The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan. boundary 2 1 August 2018; 45 (3): 149–172. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/01903659-6915629 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search nav search search input Search input auto suggest search filter Books & JournalsAll Journalsboundary 2 Search Advanced Search Chinese Drama, a new genre produced for the Chinese language market (with China as the center), while rhetorically legitimized through Taiwanese economic nationalism, has to negotiate the divisions between Chineseness and Taiwaneseness aesthetically, expressed through “traditional Chinese culture” and “Taiwanese multicultural reality.” Using the first Chinese Drama production, Inborn Pair, as an example, this essay argues that the aesthetic transaction narrates Chinese traditional culture in ways that appeal to the imperialist gaze while multicultural reality is presented in ways that reproduce the ethnic hierarchy and maintains the privileged status of Chineseness in Taiwan. The reprivileging of Chineseness operates through the commodification of Taiwaneseness as ethnicity, and thus as difference, in the age of globalization, which works to the advantage of the CCP and the KMT’s goal for unification. Chinese language market, TV drama, visibility, commodification of ethnicity, multiculturalism The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright © 2018 Duke University Press2018 You do not currently have access to this content.

Slaying Monsters: Students’ Aesthetic Transactions With Gothic Texts

This study employed case study methodology and design research to examine what aesthetic transactions (readers’ thoughts, feelings, associations, etc. that arise during a text encounter) students constructed in response to texts in a Gothic studies reading unit created by the author. The study was conducted in a seventh-grade reading classroom. Thematic analysis was used to analyze participant data. The findings revealed that participants constructed myriad aesthetic transactions of meaningful connection and imaginative contrast with the Gothic unit texts. Participants enhanced these transactions and formed new ones as a result of pedagogical practices that also nurtured their construction of aesthetic transactions. As a result of these dynamics, participants gleaned academic, personal, and global understandings. The findings suggest that prioritizing students’ construction of aesthetic transactions is critical in order for academic reading to be a meaningful experience that educates the whole person.

Timing the aesthetic experience

Even if we accept the arguments of those who argue against the very notion of “aesthetic experience”, there is still some latitude for questioning how the experience of artworks can affect or be affected by the duration of that experience. There is the issue, on the one hand, of the way aesthetic transactions manipulate our sense of time and, on the other hand, the issue of whether we can assess the proper duration of those experiences. The former looks for a kind of intra-chronology of the work involved, and is the topic of numerous investigations, for instance, as to the specific nature of fictional time. The latter inquires about the duration of the exposition to artworks and whether we can stipulate or otherwise evaluate the time needed for a relevant or rewarding aesthetic transaction to take place. To the best of my knowledge, this issue has been seldom and only indirectly addressed.

Two Modes of Contemporary Pragmatist Aesthetics

This paper identifies two central modes of discourse in contemporary pragmatist aesthetics: Cultural Emergentism and Experiential Somaesthetics. Whereas Cultural Emergentism focuses on developing a non-reductive ontology of culture, Experiential Somaesthetics preserves the traditional pragmatist emphasis on embodied experience and examines the place that the care and cultivation of the living soma has in improving our aesthetic transactions.

Changing things around: Dramatic aspect in the <i>Pericope Adulterae</i> (Jn 7:53–8:11)

In this article the transactional model of narrative as expounded by Louise Rosenblatt, supported by an analysis in terms of dramatic aspect, is employed to show how the interpolated scene in John 7:53–8:11 (known as the Pericope Adulterae and hereafter referred to as PA) functions as a pivot of power in the gospel. The content of the scene, as well as its placement within the gospel, serves to promote an aesthetic reading that focusses attention on the experience during the reading event. Awareness of sensations, images, feelings and ideas from past experiences, as well as the sounds and rhythms of the words become important. The reader responds to the aesthetic transaction, the various elements of total experience, rather than simply to the text, during and after the reading event.

Creating Digital Comics in Response to Literature: Aesthetics, Aesthetic Transactions, and Meaning Making

This article explores how eighth-grade students in a reading support class responded to the novel The Outsiders with the software program Comic Life. Rather than viewing this work from a new technologies or digital literacies perspective, we argue that unique insights can be gained by analyzing students’ digital compositions with lenses attuned to the arts, the aesthetic transaction, and student perspectives. In our presentation of four case studies, we are informed by two conceptualizations of aesthetics. First, we consider the aesthetic qualities of students’ comics by analyzing the presence and impact of image selection, color choice, and overall design on the meaning students make in their comics. Second, we draw from Rosenblatt’s discussion of the aesthetic transaction in both reading and writing as rooted in the senses, in perception, and within the students’ social worlds.We found that students worked within and across personal experiences, semiotic systems, and popular cultural texts in ways that reflected and often enriched their literary understanding. This article highlights how deliberate inquiry into students’ creative processes, products, and perspectives can provide insight into the potential of the digital arts to support meaning making and the aesthetic transaction.

The creative use of companion values in environmental education and education for sustainable development: exploring the educative moment

Our paper addresses the emergence and evolution of values in educational settings. It builds upon and extends earlier work on companion meanings to develop a theory of the creative use of companion values and meanings in education. The recognition of companion values in educational practices highlight epistemological, ethical, and aesthetic transactions that occur in ways we characterize as ‘other than modern.’ Introducing the idea of educative moments allows us to identify situations where value spheres interpenetrate and interrogate each other in the meaning-making of students and teachers. These moments occur when students suddenly experience companion meanings and values such that teacher and student must deliberate together rather than the teacher dictating some dominating epistemological, ethical, or aesthetic value. This way, it is possible to accommodate critical and creative reflection in education where new values can emerge or evolve. We illustrate the theory by empirical examples from classroom conversations.

Exploring Grade 7 Students’ Written Responses to Shaun Tan’s The Arrival

During two multifaceted, classroom-based research projects, Grade 7 students had opportunities to develop their understanding of metafictive devices and art and design elements by reading a selection of picturebooks and graphic novels. The students also had the opportunity to apply their knowledge and create their own multimodal print texts. This article focuses on The Arrival (Shaun Tan, 2006), one of the graphic novels used during the research, and explores the range of emotions that were expressed by the students in their written responses to Tan’s multimodal text. Excerpts from the students’ work are presented as exemplars of the range of negative and positive emotions evident in the written responses. Learning about various graphic novel conventions and art elements contributed to the students’ aesthetic transactions, as well as to their understanding of how representations can structure perception and interpretation.

Theorizing Aesthetic Transactions from Children's Criterial Values in Theatre for Young Audiences

Child spectators and adult theatre critics often hold opposite views on what makes the “best” theatre for young people. To explain why this enormous gap exists, we discuss children's aesthetic criteria as cross-cultural spectators and examine the theoretical and methodological differences between aesthetic appreciation and artistic criticism. To explain aesthetic transactions between child spectators and adult actors, we discuss our different philosophical interpretations of aesthetic distance and propose two models to stimulate further discussions. Future reception studies need to integrate theories of aesthetic philosophy and developmental psychology to raise the artistic quality of TYA around the world.

Children's written responses to multicultural texts: A look at aesthetic involvement and the focuses of aesthetically complex responses

Abstract The purpose of this study was to determine if students' aesthetic involvement would be influenced by the ethnicity of the student or the culture portrayed in the text. Fifth and seventh graders listened to stories representing African‐American, Hispanic, and White cultural groups. Then subjects wrote a free response. Overall the level of aesthetic involvement was not significantly influenced by the ethnicity of student or culture portrayed in the story. This implies that students of different ethnicities are able to have complex aesthetic transactions to works regardless of the culture portrayed. When data‐driven focuses of aesthetically complex responses were examined, a significant relationship was only seen on the story world focus. This supports the integration of multicultural literature into the curriculum because literature affords all students opportunities for rich experiences with literature and allows students of differing ethnicities to enjoy the books reflecting their own cultural he...

MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE AND MULTIETHNIC READERS: EXAMINING AESTHETIC INVOLVEMENT AND PREFERENCES FOR TEXT

Abstract This study sought to determine if subjects’ aesthetic involvement or story preference would be influenced by the subject's culture or culture portrayed in text. Students in 6 fifth‐grade classes and 6 seventh‐grade classes in the same school district listened to six African‐American, Hispanic, and White stories. After each story, subjects wrote a free response and rated the story. Level of aesthetic involvement was not significantly influenced by the culture of subject or text. Fifth graders preferred White stories, while seventh graders preferred African‐American texts. Subjects of minority cultures preferred stories portraying their own culture while White subjects were more homogeneous in their preference. It was concluded that although subjects of different ethnicities prefer stories reflecting their own culture, they are capable of complex aesthetic transactions regardless of the culture portrayed.

The Folklore Text: From Performance to Print

Preface 1. Introduction The Problem Methodology and Organization Significance 2. The Development of the text in American Folkloristics The Ethnolinguistic Model of the Text The Literary Model of the Text Precursors to me Performance Approach Performance-Centered Experimentation with the Text Conclusion 3. The Performance Approach: Implications For the Text Key Concepts of the Performance Approach Problems of the Performance Approach: Making the Text Fit the Theory An Aesthetic Transaction Model of Performance Conclusion 4. Intersemiotic Translation From Performance to Print Objections to Translating Performance A Definition of the Text Translation Theory Conclusion 5. Analysis of Source and Receptor Media: Performance and Print Source Medium: Performance Aural Channel: Linguistic and Paralinguistic Visual Channel: Kinesic, Artifactual, and Proxemic Tactile and Olfactory Channels Receptor Medium: Print Digital and Iconic Projections Total Impact of Projections Conclusions 6. Principle of Translating Performance Formal and Dynamic Equivalence Analytical and Perceptual Equibalence Making the Performance Report Making the Performance Record Conclusion 7. An Illustration of a Performance-Centered Text The Report The Record The Performance-Centered Text and the Literary Text: A Comparison Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

(1) Verifiability of Value (2) Naturalism and the Human Spirit

THESE two books are expositions of the naturalistic philosophy now popular in the United States and mainly derived from the teaching of John Dewey. The starting point is the view that scientific methods of investigation are valid for all spheres of thought and action. These Naturalists, however, do not use the arbitrary restrictive criteria of truth and verifiability of the Logical Positivists, and therefore their theory does not run counter to actual scientific practice as Positivism does. So far as the argument in Lepley's book is designed to show that judgments of value can be accommodated within the scientific scheme just as easily as judgments of fact and that they do constantly occur, it is evidently sound. Those essays in Krikorian's book which are straightforward inquiries into specific subjects are well done. Thus, Eliseo Vivas on "A Natural History of the Aesthetic Transaction", George Boas on "The History of Philosophy", Edward W. Strong on "The Materials of Historical Knowledge", the editor on "A Naturalistic View of Mind" and, especially, Ernest Nagel on "Logic Without Ontology" make valuable contributions to their subjects—so far as they go. These essays display the best aspect of Dewey's teaching; they are careful, fair-minded, un-dogmatic. (1) Verifiability of Value By Ray Lepley. (Columbia Studies in Philosophy, No. 7.) Pp. xi + 267. (New York: Columbia University Press; London: Oxford University Press, 1944.) 22s. net. (2) Naturalism and the Human Spirit Edited by Yervant H. Krikorian. (Columbia Studies in Philosophy, No. 8.) Pp. x + 397. (New York: Columbia University Press; London: Oxford University Press, 1944.) 30s. net.