Richard ShustermanCambridge University Press, 7/31/2012EAN 9781107019065, ISBN10: 1107019060Hardcover, 374 pages, 23.5 x 15.6 x 2.2 cmLanguage: EnglishThis book provides a richly rewarding vision of the burgeoning interdisciplinary field of somaesthetics. Composed of fourteen wide-ranging but finely integrated essays by Richard Shusterman, the originator of the field, Thinking through the Body explains the philosophical foundations of somaesthetics and applies its insights to central issues in ethics, education, cultural politics, consciousness studies, sexuality and the arts. Integrating Western philosophy, cognitive science and somatic methodologies with classical Asian theories of body, mind and action, these essays probe the nature of somatic existence and the role of body consciousness in knowledge, memory and behavior. Deploying somaesthetic perspectives to analyze key aesthetic concepts (such as style and the sublime), he offers detailed studies of embodiment in drama, dance, architecture and photography. The volume also includes somaesthetic exercises for the classroom and explores the ars erotica as an art of living.IntroductionPart I. Somatic Being, Knowing, and Teaching1. Thinking through the bodyeducating for the humanities2. The body as background3. Self-knoweldge and its discontentsfrom Socrates to somaesthetics4. Muscle memory and the somaesthetic pathologies of everyday life5. Somaesthetics in the philosophy classrooma practical approachPart II. Somaesthetics, Aesthetics, and Culture6. Somaesthetics and the limits of aesthetics7. Somaesthetics and Burke's sublime8. Pragmatism and cultural politicsfrom textualism to somaesthetics9. Body consciousness and performancePart III. The Arts and the Art of Living10. Somaesthetics and architecturea critical option11. Photography as performative process12. Asian ars erotica and the question of sexual aesthetics13. Philosophy as awakened lifeeveryday aesthetics of embodiment in American transcendentalism and Japanese zen practice14. Somatic style.
