AESTHETIC ATTITUDE

AESTHETIC ATTITUDE

According to Jerome Stolnitz in his article ‘The Aesthetic Attitude’, aesthetic attitude is defined as a disinterested and sympathetic attention to and contemplation of any object of awareness whatever, for its own sake alone.

Buttressing each part of this definition, Stolnitz avers that ‘disinterested’ entails that we do not look at the object out of concern for any ulterior purpose which it may serve. Thus, the purpose of just having the experiencing the object is the only important purpose. Our interest must rest upon the object alone. In this disinterested attention on the object of focus, the aesthetic attitude of disinterestedness helps us to isolate the object and focus upon it. We ought to, says Stolnitz, avoid judging, classifying or studying things or works of art, but, simply savouring the pleasantness and exciting character that things or works of art carry in themselves. This presents that sharp distinction between being disinterested and un-interested. While disinterestedness implies sidetracking judgmental attitudes and focusing on and looking at works of art for what they are in order become much more interested, uninterestedness implies expunging any sort of interest in things or aesthetic objects.

Furthermore, the word ‘sympathetic’, Stolnitz opines refers to the way in which we prepare ourselves to respond to the object. By being sympathetic we accept the object on its own terms to appreciate it. When we apprehend an object aesthetically, says Stolnitz, we do so in order to relish its individual quality, whether the object be charming, stirring, vivid, or all of these. If we are to really appreciate it, then, we must accept the object in its own terms. We must make ourselves receptive to the object and set ourselves to accept whatever it may offer to perception. This implies the need to inhibit any unsympathetic responses capable of alienating us from the object and are hostile to the object. To be able to validly assign aesthetic worth on any object, we must be able to consider such objects aesthetically by allowing the object in question to speak to us for themselves. And by doing so, we must excise attitudes that interpose our moral, religious, ethical or political prejudices on the object in view, as this disrupts the aesthetic attitude. Milton’s sonnet “On the Late Massacre in Piedmont” for instance, is a ringing protest called forth by an event which occurred shortly before the writing of the poem. But while, we may employ modern parameters in offhandedly judging it, the heated questions of religion and politics which enter into it seem very remote to us now.

To be ‘sympathetic’ then in aesthetic experience, means giving the object the chance to speak for itself and to show how it can be interesting to perception.

            More so, the word ‘attention’ in the definition of aesthetic attitude begs to be clarified. By attention, Stolnitz asseverates, we want to make the value of the object come fully alive in our experience. When listening to a rhythmically exciting piece of music which absorbs us with its energy and movement, or when we read a novel which creates great suspense, we give our earnest attention to it and in doing so, exclude almost everything else in our surroundings. Although attention is always a matter of degree, but to whatever extent it does so, experience is aesthetic only when an object holds our attention.

            However, Stolnitz opines that aesthetic attention is accompanied by activity. This activity is either evoked by disinterested perception of the object, or else is required by it. But, focusing upon the object and acting in regard to it, is not all that is meant by aesthetic attention. To savour fully the distinctive value of the object, we must be attentive to its frequently complex and subtle details. This brings to the fore the necessity of discrimination. One could fail to perceive the individuality of every work of art; that one symphony is different in sound from a piece of long-hair music; and that one lyric poem is to be distinguished from another, if one does not develop discriminating attention to art works.

            On the whole, says Stolnitz, any object at all can be apprehended aesthetically, that is, no object is inherently unaesthetic. This is evidenced in the fact that, human beings have found perceptual enjoyment in things which people of earlier times or other cultures judged to be uninviting or unaesthetic. Thus, the aesthetic attitude is an impersonal, disinterested and sympathetic attention to an object of focus, an attitude that allows the object speak for itself and avoids transposing prejudices, biases and preconceptions on any object of focus whatsoever.

            George Dickie in ‘The Myth of the Aesthetic Attitude’ charts a different and critique-like course. He argues here that that the notion of the aesthetic attitude proposed by Jerome Stolnitz is a myth, which misleads aesthetic theory.

Dickie begins by criticizing the character of disinterested attention in Stolnitz’s definition of the aesthetic attitude. According to Dickie, it can make sense to speak, for example, of listening disinterestedly to music only if it makes sense to speak of listening interestedly to music. Using Stolnitz’s definition of ‘disinterestedness’, two situations would have to be described as ‘listening with no ulterior purpose (disinterestedly) and ‘listening with an ulterior purpose (interestedly). Two people for instance could listen to the same piece of music, one to analyze it and prepare for an examination, and the other with no ulterior motive. While they both listen, they both also differ in motives or intentions. Thus, says Dickie, the apparent perceptual distinction (that is, listening disinterestedly or interestedly) is actually a motivational or an intentional distinction. Motive or intention differs from action. Dickie demonstrates that the only difference between the listening of two listeners is their purpose and suggests that in reality there is nothing different about their attention at all. Therefore, Dickie argues that the notion of disinterestedness cannot be used to refer to a special kind of attention. Rather, disinterestedness is a term which is used to make clear that an action has certain kinds of motives. Attending to an object has its motives but the attending itself is neither interested nor disinterested.

Furthermore, and in a bid to further show the untenability of the disinterestedness character, while Stolnitz thinks that we cannot criticize while appreciating a work of art, because, criticism will unhealthily interfere with appreciation, Dickie employs the art critic analogy to refute this claim. According to Dickie, the art critic surely has an ulterior purpose, namely, to analyze and evaluate the object he/she observes, and if Stolnitz is to be right, then insofar as a person functions as a critic then he/she cannot function as an appreciator.

On this note, Dickie avers that Stolnitz confuses a perceptual distinction with a motivational one. But since, as earlier evinced, attending to an object has its motives but the attending itself is neither interested nor disinterested, the critic differs from other percipients only in his/her motives and intentions and not in the way in which he/she attends to a work of art.

More so, while Dickie develops a convincing argument against Stolnitz’s theory of the aesthetic attitude, he does only really focus on one aspect of it - disinterestedness - and does not effectively address the idea of sympathetic attention, for example. In his argument, Stolnitz stresses the importance of considering all the aspects of his definition of the aesthetic attitude, so for this reason, Dickie’s attempt at challenging Stolnitz’s theory is counter-productive.

MY POSITION  

            Aesthetics is the science of ‘oughtness’ and not of ‘isness.’ Stolnitz’s proposal is a presentation of an ideal, that is, what ought to be done. That such a proposal is for now not achieved does not preclude the need for an insistence on striving for the ‘ought.’ Dickie conflates what is with what ought and this is the provenance of the problem incurred in his theses.

            I am fully in favour of Stolnitz’s theses because they speak of the need to approach works of art without being surrounded by a montage of prejudices and biases. On this note, his theses should not be understood as implying the total absence of our ethical, religious, sexual affiliations. While these conceptual primitives might be somewhat altogether present, there is a need to transcend them.