The arts

About: The arts is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 29423 publications have been published within this topic receiving 294419 citations. The topic is also known as: the arts & Arts in general.

Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture

Abstract: The sociology of culture seeks to locate the world of the arts within the broader context of the institutions and ideology of society. This wide-ranging set covers the sociology of dance, literary taste and cinema. Taking into account also the cultural context of play and child-rearing, this is important reading for students and researchers in Cultural Studies.

Wicked Problems in Design Thinking

Abstract: Introduction Despite efforts to discover the foundations of design thinking in the fine arts, the natural sciences, or most recently, the social sciences, design eludes reduction and remains a surprisingly flexible activity. No single definition of design, or branches of professionalized practice such as industrial or graphic design, adequately covers the diversity of ideas and methods gathered together under the label. Indeed, the variety of research reported in conference papers, journal articles, and books suggests that design continues to expand in its meanings and connections, revealing unexpected dimensions in practice as well as understanding. This follows the trend of design thinking in the twentieth century, for we have seen design grow from a trade activity to a segmentedprofession to afield for technical research and to what now should be recognized as a new liberal art of technological culture. It may seem unusual to talk about design as a liberal art, particularly when many people are accustomed to identifying the liberal arts with the traditional "arts and sciences" that are institutionalized in colleges and universities. But the liberal arts are undergoing a revolutionary transformation in twentieth-century culture, and design is one of the areas in which this transformation is strikingly evident. To understand the change that is now underway, it is important to recognize that what are commonly regarded as the liberal arts today are not outside of history. They originated in the Renaissance and underwent prolonged development that culminated in the nineteenth century as a vision of an encyclopedic education of beaux arts, belles lettres, history, various natural sciences and mathematics, philosophy, and the fledgling social sciences. This circle of learning was divided into particular subject matters, each with a proper method or set of methods suitable to its exploration. At their peak as liberal arts, these subject matters provided an integrated understanding of human experience and the array of available knowledge. By the end of the nineteenth century, however, existing subjects were explored with progressively more refined methods, and new subjects were added to accord with advances in knowledge. As a This essay is based on a paper presented at 'Colloque Recherches sur le Design: Incitations, Implications, Interactions," the first French university symposium on design research held October 1990 at l'Universit6 de Technologie de Compiegne, Compiegne, France.

The Arts and the Creation of Mind

Abstract: Although the arts are often thought to be closer to the rim of education than to its core, they are, surprisingly, critically important means for developing complex and subtle aspects of the mind, argues Elliot Eisner in this engrossing book. In it he describes how various forms of thinking are evoked, developed, and refined through the arts. These forms of thinking, Eisner argues, are more helpful in dealing with the ambiguities and uncertainties of daily life than are the formally structured curricula that are employed today in schools. Offering a rich array of examples, Eisner describes different approaches to the teaching of the arts and the virtues each possesses when well taught. He discusses especially nettlesome issues pertaining to the evaluation of performance in the arts. Perhaps most important, Eisner provides a fresh and admittedly iconoclastic perspective on what the arts can contribute to education, namely a new vision of both its aims and its means. This new perspective, Eisner argues, is especially important today, a time at which mechanistic forms of technical rationality often dominate our thinking about the conduct and assessment of education.

Releasing the imagination : essays on education, the arts, and social change

Abstract: Introduction: A Quest for Meaning Part One: Creating Possibilities 1. Seeking Contexts 2. Imagination, Breakthroughs, and the Unexpected 3. Imagination, Community, and the School 4. Consciousness and the Public Space 5. Social Vision and the Dance of Life 6. The Shapes of Childhood Recalled Part Two: Imagination and Education 7. Blue Guitars and the Search for Curriculum 8. Writing to Learn 9. Teaching for Openings 10. Art and Imagination 11. Texts and Margins Part Three: Community in the Making 12. The Passions of Pluralism 13. Standards, Common Learnings, and Diversity 14. Multiple Voices and Multiple Realities.