Performing Live - by Richard Shusterman (Paperback)

About the Book

Current philosophies of art remain sadly dominated by visions of its end and lamentations of decline. Defining the very notions of art and the aesthetic as special products of Western modernity, they suggest that postmodern challenges to traditional...

Book Synopsis

Current philosophies of art remain sadly dominated by visions of its end and lamentations of decline. Defining the very notions of art and the aesthetic as special products of Western modernity, they suggest that postmodern challenges to traditional high culture pose a devastating danger to art's future. Richard Shusterman's new book cuts through the seductive confusions of these views by tracing the earthy roots of aesthetic experience and showing how the recent flourishing of aesthetic forms outside modernity's sacralized realm of fine art evince the persistent presence of an artistic impulse far deeper and more durable than the modernist moment. Performing Live defends the abiding power of aesthetic experience by exploring its diverse roles, methods, and meanings, especially in fields marginal to traditional aesthetics but now most vibrantly alive in today's culture and new media. Ranging from rap, techno, and country music to cinema, cyberspace and urban design, Shusterman develops his radical theory of "somaesthetics," charting the complex network of bodily arts so prominent in contemporary life and self-styling. By blending concrete aesthetic analysis with insightful social critique, Shusterman, a well-known pragmatist philosopher, provides a rich menu and critical guide for today's pursuit of the art of living.

Review Quotes

Shusterman's new book is a collection of mutually complementary essays which encompass a decade of writing. It represents his pragmatist aesthetics critically applied to a range of issues, theories, and methods foregrounded by recent work in both analytic and continental philosophy. Interestingly, the contemporary vitality of some of these issues is in part due to the influence of Shusterman's previous writings.... Shusterman's text is enormously sophisticated not only in the range of philosophical and cultural sources which he is able to draw upon, but also in the probing and succinct way in which these are applied.

The essays are lively and engaging in many ways. Not only is Shusterman informative about topics relating to mass-media arts and self-fashioning, his reflections consistently raise important philosophical issues concerning our postmodernist condition and the cultural and sociological factors fostering it. Furthermore, Shusterman's arguments are fecund and provocative, his style vigorous, and his critique of current analytical and continental philosophical approaches adroit.... We cannot but admire the skill and verve of Shusterman's attempts to bring philosophy back to its original goals of teaching us how to live more fully and wisely.

About the Author

Richard Shusterman is Professor of Philosophy at Temple University and the Collège International de Philosophie in Paris. His other works include Pragmatist Aesthetics and Practicing Philosophy: Pragmatism and the Philosophical Life.