State University of New York at Stony Brook
Department of Philosophy
2013 Lecture Series
You are cordially invited to a
lecture by
Richard Shusterman
Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar in the Humanities and Director of the Center for Body, Mind, and Culture
Florida Atlantic University
Lecture:
"Criticality in Architecture: A Somaesthetic Perspective"
Recent discussions in architectural theory have been concerned with the questioning of architecture's critical role, if not also the growing loss or erosion of this function with the waning of modernism. Many see the decline in criticality as resulting from an increased appreciation of the architectural factor of atmosphere. This airy, elusive value seems especially opposed to critical analysis, because its essentially sensory and experiential character resists reduction to conceptual treatment through traditional discursive categories and methods. This paper first articulates the body’s essential centrality to architecture and examines the concept of criticality. It then shows how the new field of somaesthetics, with its focus on heightening embodied sensory awareness, can present a new option for critically dealing with our perception of architectural atmosphere so that we can be freed from the influence that the unreflective, passive absorption of atmosphere can wield on us.
Richard Shusterman is the Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar in the Humanities and Director of the Center for Body, Mind, and Culture at Florida Atlantic University. His major authored books include Thinking through the Body; Body Consciousness; Surface and Depth; Performing Live; Practicing Philosophy; and Pragmatist Aesthetics (now published in fifteen languages). Shusterman received his doctorate in philosophy from Oxford and has held academic appointments in France, Germany, Israel, and Japan. The French government honored him as a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques, and he was awarded research grants from the NEH, Fulbright Commission, ACLS, Humboldt Foundation, and UNESCO.
Tuesday January 30th, 2013
1:00 pm
Harriman Hall 214
Harriman Hall, Stony Brook, NY 11794-3750 – Telephone 631-632-7570 Fax 631-632-7522