Information: Imagination Project

In January 2011, Alix Cohen (Leeds), Cain Todd (Lancaster) and Fabian Dorsch (Fribourg) will start a SNF-funded research project on the role of the imagination in aesthetics and ethics, both from a systematic and a historical perspective. The project will be based at the chairs of Richard Glauser (Neuchatel) and Gianfranco Soldati (Fribourg), and the research description can be found here. One hope is that other people will participate as well, such as Rob Hopkins (Sheffield) and Kathleen Stock (Sussex). If you would like to know more or get involved please contact Fabian Dorsch.

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ESA: Conference 2010

The second annual conference of the European Society for Aesthetics will take place in Turin from the 27th to the 29th of May. Further information should soon be available here.

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Journal: Studies in East European Thought

We would like to draw your attention to a journal of the Springer Verlag which is edited by Edward Swiderski, one of the members of AiF. Please contact him or have a look at its website for further information or for submitting a paper.

Studies in East European Thought provides a forum for Western-language writings on philosophy and philosophers who identify with the history and cultures of East and Central Europe, including Russia, Ukraine, and the Baltic States. The contents include descriptive, critical, comparative, and historical studies of individuals, schools, currents, and institutions whose work and influence are widely regarded in their own environments to be philosophical or provide insight into the socio-cultural conditions of philosophical life in Eastern Europe.

Coverage includes concepts of the social, the cultural and the political, following the demise of Marxism-Leninism; foundational questions in metaphysics and epistemology; the standing of ‘culture theory’ (e.g., Russian ‘kul’turologija’); the reception of Western theories and methods as well as intellectual traditions; the reassessment of ‘local’ intellectual traditions; ethics, moral theory, theology and religious studies, and much more.

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Fabian Dorsch: Imagination and Fictional Emotions

This paper critically discusses Richard Moran’s classic essay on the role of imagining in aesthetics, with a focus on the phenomenon of imagining feelings in response to fictions. A draft version is to be found here.

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Rob Hopkins: Factive Pictorial Experience: What’s Special about Photographs?

Rob will present this paper on 24th of April at 17:15 in the room MIS 4122 in the main building of the University of Fribourg, followed by a short commentary by Jiri Benovsky. Please write to Fabian to receive a copy of Rob’s paper and Jiri’s response.

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ESA: Conference 2009

The first annual ESA conference takes place on the weekend of the 4th and the 5th of April 2009 at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland).

The goals of the conference are to highlight some recent European research done in aesthetics, to introduce the ESA to the academic community, and to present and discuss the purposes of the ESA.

Apart from the first general assembly of the ESA, there will be talks by the following speakers:
- Rob Hopkins (Sheffield)
- Pauline von Bonsdorff (Jyväskylä)
- Aleš Erjavec (Ljubljana)
- Morten Kyndrup (Aarhus)
- Ludger Schwarte (Zürich)
- Paolo Spinicci (Milano)
- Kathleen Stock (Sussex)
- John Zeimbekis (Grenoble)

The detailed programme of the conference can be accessed here.

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Conference: Perception and Aesthetic Experience

Date: 12. – 13.12.2008
Location: University of Fribourg, Miséricorde, Salle Jaeggi

There will soon be another workshop related to aesthetics, with a paper on aesthetic realism and expressivism by Cain Todd, and a paper on pictorial experience and imagining by Tom Crowther.

Here’s the full list of speakers:
- Thomas Crowther (Heythrop College London)
- Akiko Frischhut (Geneva & Glasgow)
- Matthew Soteriou (Warwick)
- Cain Todd (Lancaster)

The programme can be found here.

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ESA: Inaugural Meeting

Dates: 21. – 22.11.2008
Location: University of Fribourg, Salle Jaeggi

Our plans for founding the European Society for Aesthetics are finally becoming very concrete. The foundational meeting will take place next month and we will discuss the nature and purpose of the ESA and hope to elect a first provisional executive committee.

So far, the following have accepted our invitation to attend:
- Luca Angelone (Torino)
- Arto Haapala (Helsinki)
- Stepan Kubalik (Praha)
- Catrin Misselhorn (Tübingen)
- Simo Säätelä (Bergen)
- Paolo Spinicci (Milano)
- Jakub Stejskal (Praha)
- Marta Tafalla (Barcelona)
- Cain Todd (Lancaster)
- Fabian Dorsch (Fribourg)

You may find the programme of the meeting here, and the proposed statutes of the ESA here.

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