I really dug on Kant in the Wysocki article. It was interesting how she labeled his philosophical tendencies as gendered, due to how he thought at the time, combined with how women were perceived as not being able to have universal judgments. I frankly do not see his philosphy in this light. Kant speaks of universals that are beautiful because they align with our nature and is formally inherent in the object. I can't tell in the article if she is attacking Kant's philosophy of recognizing beauty or not. I would have to say I disagree with Wysocki when she quotes the "irony" Mary Shelley points out that Kant's freedom of aesthetics leaves no room for the family, love, or pleasure. Families are the universal structure to life so how does it leave no room for the love or pleasure of the family. One could walk down the street and see a family of six and see the beauty in the bonds they share. I can understand her argument about the particularity that is lacking when an object is formally abstracted and generalized to some universal truth. In these certain cases where she lists TV, magazines, ads, etc...I think she is missing the boat because what is portrayed in these advertisements of our day, in my opinion, is not a Kantian universal ideal of beauty.
I can see where she is going with her argument towards the end, and in some cases I agree that a more particulate and temporal understanding of beauty takes place between two people can be more beneficial, rather than some distant abstract form that every person needs to be modeled around or is deemed faulty or imperfect. The abstract form is the perfect curvature and waistline combined with an unblemished face which is prioritized over the beauty found in the old person who has lived a life, or a not so perfect person who is trying their best to achieve their dreams. I agree that our popular culture espouses the first mode of abstract perfectionism with it's models that must fit a certain category or a photo-shopped impeccable complexion. I definitely think that Kant's universal truths found in nature are much more appreciative of true beauty and I feel like Wysocki confuses it with the current trends and fashions of our time, which tend to objectify women.
WHEW....! I hope i got some ideas across. Now to Bernhart, whom I thought did a clear and concise job of telling me why the Wetlands paper was so eye catching, in a non-visual way of writing. Very clever that he wrote of it so well in such a manner. Interestingly at the end he noted how no english classes teach both ways of crafting documents and related how digital age media REQUIRES it! With screens everywhere, especially portable ones, it is important to be able to get your point across in the amount of space you have with out having to scroll down. That first eye catching glimpse of the screen will either captivate the viewer or the viewer will ignore the page and search for something else. The diagram of Visual Organization of Written Texts is actually quite fascinating. The importance of the visual Gestalts in both the visually and non-visually informativetexts is almost like a Kantian universal!!! By that I mean most every professional visual and non-visual informative text are written or drafted with these understandings that if they form their texts these ways that they will captivate most any human audience. Great articles!
Signing off now, CIAO!
P.s. Can anyone guess what movie my the quote in my title is a pun of? Let me know if you need hints ; )
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