The School of Arts invites you to join our exciting research events this coming term…
Wednesday 5th October, 5pm-7pm, Jarman Studio 2, University of Kent
A Centre for Cognition, Kinesthetics and Performance (CKP) and Centre for Popular and Comic Performance (PCP) seminar with
Angie Varakis, University of Kent
‘Positive Emotion and Cognition in the Spectating of Aristophanic Comedy’
What can positive psychology tell us about the ancient audience’s experience of Aristophanic comedy? Was the performance of comedy an event that was largely controlled by the comic poet and the Athenian state, or did it, in fact, broaden the mind of its spectators enhancing their ability to process information in a creative and individual way?
In the present paper I shall approach Aristophanic comedy as an embodied event and affective performance. In doing so I shall argue that positive emotion and comic laughter were not merely a response that measured the popularity and success of the comedy but had a much more fundamental role to play in shaping the audience’s experience of the comedy with its numerous interpretative possibilities and allusions. Drawing from cognitive science and positive psychology that have proven that positive emotions broadens cognition I shall argue that the ‘openness’ of Aristophanic comedy was not only a key characteristic of the play as a literary text but was a key feature of the festive experience of Aristophanic performance which through its festive, humorous and uplifting environment, facilitated a more flexible and imaginative way of processing visual and conceptual information.
Wednesday 19th October, 4pm – 6pm, Keynes Lecture Theatre 2, University of Kent
An Aesthetics Research Centre (ARC) seminar with
Professor Bart Vandenabeele, Ghent University, Belgium
Thursday 17th November, 11am – 5pm, Studio 3 Gallery, University of Kent
An Aesthetics Research Centre (ARC) symposium
‘Art or Evidence: What is Photography?’
A symposium on Diarmuid Costello’s forthcoming book On Photography: A Philosophical Inquiry (Routledge 2017).
12.30 – 13.00…………Introduction
13.00 – 14.00…………Murray Smith
14.00 – 15.00…………Paloma Atencia-Linares
15.00 – 15.30…………Coffee Break
15.30 – 16.30…………David Company
16.30 – 17.30…………Diarmuid Costello
Organised by the Aesthetics Research Centre and supported by the Art History and Visual Cultures Research Centre.
Wednesday 30th November, 5pm-7pm, Keynes Lecture Theatre 2, University of Kent
A Centre for Film and Media Research Seminar with
Paul MacDonald
Thursday 8th December, 4pm-6pm, Grimond Lecture Theatre 2, University of Kent
An Aesthetics Research Centre (ARC) workshop with
Professor Anne Eaton
Saturday 10th December – Sunday 11th December, 9am-6pm, University of Kent
A Centre for Film and Media Research and Aesthetics Research Centre conference
‘Sex and the Cinema Conference’
From the extremes of Disney canoodling at one end of the spectrum to pornography at the other, sex has always had a central role in moving images. This role has never been confined to representations in individual scenes, but has taken shape in every industrial and cultural aspect of their production, dissemination and consumption, from the Hollywood casting couch and red-light-district alleyways, to parked cars at drive-ins and the YouPorn user’s bedroom. So too has sex held a key position in film scholarship, aesthetics and the cognate disciplines that appraise moving images and their function in society. In recent years, this presence has only grown, in the form of key individual publications as well as burgeoning subfields (e.g., porn studies) and objects of inquiry (e.g., grindhouse programming).
As a substantial intervention into this ongoing research, the Aesthetics Research Centre, the Centre for Film and Media Research, and the journal Film Studies will stage a major international conference at the University of Kent in Canterbury (UK), to be held 10-11 December 2016.
More information and booking details coming soon.
Monday 12th December, 4pm-6pm, Keynes Seminar Room 4, University of Kent
An Aesthetics Research Centre (ARC) seminar with
Professor Anne Eaton
If you have any questions about the above events please contact Leila Jones on L.S.Jones@kent.ac.uk