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Staying Alive: A Survival Manual for the Liberal Arts
- Author(s):
- L.O. Aranye Fradenburg
- Editor(s):
- Eileen Joy (see profile)
- Date:
- 2013
- Group(s):
- Medieval Studies
- Subject(s):
- Education--Philosophy, Intersubjectivity, Neurosciences--Philosophy, Psychoanalysis
- Item Type:
- Book
- Tag(s):
- Educational philosophy, Medieval studies, Philosophy of neuroscience
- Permanent URL:
- http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/M60V89H1Q
- Abstract:
- Staying Alive: A Survival Manual for the Liberal Arts fiercely defends the liberal arts in and from an age of neoliberal capital and techno-corporatization run amok, arguing that the public university’s purpose is not vocational training, but rather the cultivation of “artfulness,” including the art of making knowledge. Humanist pedagogy and research use play and intersubjective exchange to foster forms of artfulness critical to the future of our species. From perception to reality-testing to concept-formation and logic, the arts and humanities teach us to see, hear and respond more keenly, and to imagine, or “model,” new futures and possibilities. Bringing together psychoanalysis, neuroscience, animal behavioral research, biology & evolutionary theory, and premodern literarature (from Virgil to Chaucer to Shakespeare), Fradenburg offers a bracing polemic against the technocrats of higher education and a vibrant new vision for the humanities as both living art and new life science. Contrary to recent polemics that simply urge the humanities to become more scientistic or technology-focused, to demonstrate their utility or even trophy their uselessness, Staying Alive does something remarkably different: it argues for the humanism of a new scientific paradigm based on complexity theory and holistic and ecological approaches to knowledge-making. It urges us to take the further step of realizing not only that we can promote and enhance neuroplastic connectivity and social-emotional cognition, but also that the humanities have always already been doing so. “Nature always exceeds itself in its expressivity” — which is to say that living is itself an art, and artfulness is necessary for living: for adaptation and innovation, for forging rich and varied relationships with other minds, bodies and things, and thus, for thriving — whether in the boardroom or the art gallery, the biology lab or the recording studio, the alley or the playground, the book or the dream.
- Metadata:
- xml
- Published as:
- Book Show details
- Publisher:
- punctum books
- Pub. Date:
- 2013
- Version:
- 1.0
- ISBN:
- 978-0-6159065-0-8
- Status:
- Published
- Last Updated:
- 5 years ago
- License:
- Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
- Share this:
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