Is It Good?

Seminar in Aesthetics and Criticism

Kevin Purrone, Phd

II. Taste

Study Guide

Sources

Suter, Ronald. The Problem of Taste. Washington, D.C. : University Press of America, 1979.

C. E. M. Joad. (Cyril Edwin Mitchinson) Matter, Life and Value. London: Oxford University Press, 1929.

George Santayana. The Sense of Beauty: Being the Outline of Aesthetic Theory. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1896.

P.A. Schilpp, ed., The Philosophy of George Santayana. New York: Tudor Publishing Co. 1940.

Leo Tolstoy. What Is Art? 1898. Translated by Aylmer Maude. New York: Oxford University Press, 1962.

David Hume. Of the Standard of Taste. first published in 1757 in Four Dissertations. London: printed for A. Millar. Reprinted in Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary. London: Oxford University Press, 1963.

A. J. Ayer. (Alfred Jules) Language, Truth and Logic. New York, Dover Publications. 1952.

Arnold Isenberg. "Critical Communication," Philosophical Review, Vol. LVII. 1949.

Grant Allen. Physiological aesthetics. New York : Garland Pub., 1977. Reprint of the 1877 ed. published by H. S. King, London.

"Taste" is an 18th and 19th century term referring to the ability to have critical discernment, appreciation and judgment of art objects. "Taste" frequently connotes "Good Taste." It usually has at least two parts: the aesthetic temperament, or delicacy of feeling and observation, and the development of aesthetic judgment by exercise, experience and discipline. Taste is to Aesthetics as Character is to Ethics. Whether there is a universal or relative standard of taste is the unanswered question in aesthetic theory.

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art
 

2. George Santayana
 

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art
 
 

3. Leo Tolstoy
 

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art
 
 

4. David Hume
 

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art
 
 

5. A. J. Ayer
 

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art
 

6. Arnold Isenberg
 

Main Points of the theory
 

Value of the Theory
 

Examples that the theory defines as art