María José Alcaraz León: Arrogated Expression as a Possible Aesthetic Failur

The Research Seminar Series in Philosophy invites you to a seminar with María José Alcaraz León, Murcia and Uppsala, "Arrogated Expression as a Possible Aesthetic Failure".

Abstract: 
The expressive content of artworks is often characterized in terms of the response it merits. Thus, a film is comic or successes in presenting a comic perspective on certain subject matter if it makes it appropriate to laugh or if it merits laughing. In this sense, the comic character of the film -or its success in embodying a particular perspective- does not depend on the historical, social, or genre identity features of the artist who produces the work, but on the capacity of the work to merit that response.  

This view seems to contrast with a recent idea that questions the expressive success of certain works because their producers' historical, social, or genre identity do not align with the expressing content's characteristic group. Following this intuition, a white male writer cannot truly express through a literary work what it is to be a black female or what it is embody such a perspective given certain socio-historical conditions. Furthermore, in trying to do so, the writer might be doing something harmful to the very expressive project those who can inhabit that perspective may truthfully engage in.

In my talk I would like to examine the motivations for these two contrasting ideas and to present some analysis of the kind of failure that might be involved in the cases where the artist's identity seems to matter for the expressive achievement/failure at stake. 

All interested are welcome to participate in this seminar.

About the seminar series

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