• Title/Summary/Keyword: 'moral beauty'

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A Moralist of Beauty in America: Emerson on the Cultivation of Public Virtue in Liberal Democracy

  • Park, Jin-gon
    • American Studies
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    • v.44 no.2
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    • pp.159-191
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    • 2021
  • "In the United States, you almost never say that virtue is beautiful," Alexis de Tocqueville reports in Democracy in America. Yet Ralph Waldo Emerson, arguably the most prominent American moralist in the nineteenth century, stands as an exception to Tocqueville's generalization. This article explores Emerson's perspective on beauty in the moral education of democratic citizens. His interest in this aesthetic category partly stemmed from his deep concern about both the moral inaction and interest politics in commercial culture. As a response to the crisis, Emerson conceived ethical beauty as a key promoter of public-minded democratic citizenship as exemplified by the American abolitionists, and his own practice as a poetic moralist further illustrates this belief. Emerson's aesthetic approach to the cultivation of public virtue in liberal democracy offers a meaningful comparison to contemporary neo-Tocquevillian emphasis on the language of interest or duty.

Ideal Beauty Represented in Dress - Focused on the Renaissance and Baroque Periods - (복식에 표현된 시대적 이상미 - 르네상스.바로크 시대를 중심으로 -)

  • Shin, Joo-Young
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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    • v.58 no.3
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    • pp.131-148
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    • 2008
  • Each stylistic period through history has its own unique look. The characteristic look of each period is completed and visualized with its prevailing ideologies, aesthetic consciousness and morality by means of 'form'. A period expresses its characteristics in accordance with form according to the widespread preferences of the time. Among the various cultural factors that form the look of the time, those that the period holds as ideal aesthetic values create the concept of 'ideal beauty' for that period. This study begins by establishing the conceptual definition of 'ideal beauty' and develops the premise that dress reflected ideal beauty. To attain the goal of the study, the selected objects are dresses represented in paintings, the actual garments from the Renaissance to Baroque periods and written references about art, art history, and history of costume. The results, based upon a theoretical study of the zeitgeist and aesthetic values of the 16th and 17th centuries, are as follows: first, ideal beauty influences the substance and form that constitute dress style. It is a byproduct of the spirit of time, the zeitgeist. The concept of ideal beauty is born within the lifestyle pursued by the ruling class and focuses on the body as an epitome of beauty, moral values, custom, lifestyle and taste as it becomes visualized via form. Second, the aspect of dress representing the ideal beauty of particular time varied according to the times. In both periods, power and dignity were used to achieve the ideal aesthetic values. In the Renaissance, power was expressed by the horizontal extension of dress (i.e. wide farthingales and sleeves) and in the Baroque period, by vertical extension (i.e. long and tall wigs, fontanges and trains). It can be said that fashion in both periods achieved an ideal, such as power and dignity, via the same means, by extending dress sizes, but the ways in which those ideals were portrayed in each period's dress yielded very contrary styles. It is understood through this study that ideal beauty influenced the dress style of the Renaissance and Baroque periods and played a decisive role in determining its forms and symbolic meanings.

STUDY ON FEMINITY AND THE IDEAL BEAUTY OF BODY IMPLIED IN THE FASHION AND THE ANTI-FASHION MOVEMENT IN THE VICTORIAN PERIOD (II) (빅토리아시대 유행복식과 반유행복식 운동에 나타난 여성성과 인체미에 관한 연구 (II))

  • 김정선;김민자
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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    • v.51 no.6
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    • pp.5-24
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    • 2001
  • This paper is intended to explore femininity the ideal beauty of body and the features in fashion pursued in the Fashion system and the Anti-Fashion Movement in the Victorian period, on which the modern fashion is based. For the informative facts needed in this paper, books on history, fashion history, feminism, art history of aestheticism and the ideal beauty of body are referred to. On the part Ⅱ of this paper, the femininity and the ideal beauty of body implied in the Aesthetic Movement and Rational Dress Movement as the anti-fashion movement in the Victorian period will be reviewed. Following are the conclusion : First, the works in Aesthetic Movement mainly include the image of sensual female. The essence of femininity is categorized by cultural value, poetic spirit. appetite for sex and self-expression. The ideal beauty of body pursued in this movement is the beauty of immatured body, which means rejection of maternity as well as appetite for sex in the form of metaphor of the power and enthusiasm of female. The features of Aesthetic Movement emphasize the image of sensual and characteristic woman. These features are expressed in the natural waist line and the vertical H silhouette of high waist, natural exposure of body by means of drapery, simplicity and decency by design without fixed forms and seemingly faded colors. Second, Rational Dress Movement attempted to evaluate the femininity in a different way and ultimately pursued masculinity. Therefore, morality, liberty, intelligence, spirituality, self-control, willingness, which had been believed to exclusively belong to male, are added to the categories of femininity. The ideal beauty of body is expressed in the form of Venus Coelestic which is refined and strong. This symbolizes woman's freeing from the fate of reproduction and subordinate relationship with male, morality, decision of one's own and willingness. The features of Rational Dress Movement represent the image of strong-willed and moral woman in its internal meaning. The features of its fashions represent the concealment of the body, emphasis on activeness in pants without decoration and simplicity in its external form. All these features resulted from the pursuit of masculinity.

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Aesthetic Characteristics of Yohji Yamamoto's Works -Focused on Aesthetic Characteristics of Traditional Costume- (Yohji Yamamoto 작품에 나타난 미적특성 - 전통복식 미적특성을 중심으로 -)

  • Yaung, Hyeon-Ju;Cho, Youn-Joo
    • Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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    • v.4 no.4
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    • pp.339-346
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    • 2002
  • This study analyzed the works, introduced in the collections of Yohji Yamamoto in an aim to identify traditional aesthetic and design concepts. As the data to study the concept and expression of the designer, fashion photographs were gathered in a focus on collections since 1990's. The traditional aesthetic expressed in the works of Yohji Yamamoto were characterized by the external aesthetics and the internal aesthetics. The traditional aesthetic of external aesthetics were classified into the plasticity and the wearing, and those of internal aesthetics were divided into the moderation, expertness and aesthetic exclusion. The plasticity was extracted into line, form and color. The wearing was presented artist of purpose through the mutual text. The moderation was based on the moral goodness and the aesthetical beauty. The expertness represented the fitting method and mutual reaction of color. through the natural beauty. The aesthetic exclusion was expressed through simplicity, loftiness, and unbalance.

The Factors of Luxury Trend and Fashion Changes as Result of Costume Regulations during Choson Dynasty: 17th and 18th Century (조선시대 복식규제를 통해서 본 사치풍조의 제 요인과 복식변화 - 17.18세기를 중심으로 -)

  • 이민주
    • The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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    • v.11 no.4
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    • pp.551-561
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    • 2003
  • The regulations for costume were set to improve people's moral fiber and cultural standards. In the 17th and 18th century, the main aim of this regulation was to prohibit luxury. But being the turning point to a modem state, with breaking social status and development of commerce, industry, and the mind of imitation, regulation for luxury wasn't enforced, but rather it brought many revolutionary changes in costume. Restraining human impulse to express beauty was no longer subject to regulation. Therefore, people started to recognize the human figure with shorter Jegory(저고리) and strengthened ceremonial capacity by broadening po's(포) sleeves. The silk fabrics were the most popular fabric during this era, special patterns were added for decoration and also for blessings. Complementary colors were used for contrast on the collar (깃), cuffs (끝동), Gyotrnagi (곁마기), and sash (고름). This color composition gave a younger and more active look. And with red stripes on the sleeves, it emphasized the beauty of the color arrangements as well as providing protection from the devil.

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The Aesthetic Values of 20th Century Functionalist Fashion Design (20세기 기능주의 패션디자인의 미적 가치와 조형성)

  • 하지수;김민자
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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    • v.52 no.6
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    • pp.85-102
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    • 2002
  • The research has the aim of defining the special characteristics of the functionalist fashion design in the 20th century by understanding the essence of functionalism in the sociocultural contexts and studying functionalism in fashion design and architectural and product design by the comparative. Giving careful consideration to functionalist fashion design in the 20th century makes it possible to foresee the way of fashion design to meet the needs of the moderns and men of the future world. To obtain the purposes, documentary study and comparative study have been executed. Main results are as follows. Functionalism stressed in the beginning of the 20th century can be defined and categorized using three analogies, mechanical analogy of futuristic quality based on mechanical aesthetics and standardization by mass production, organic analogy in which the perfect beauty of nature is stressed on, moral analogy of fitness for purpose and absence of ornament based on integrity and sincerity. In while, functionalism in 1990s has been developed in different ways from those analogies. In comparative studies, functionalist fashion design and architectural and product design have the dissimilarity as well as the similarity of formative features. Since fashion design has much closer relation to human body and movements. it has been expressed considering a division of men and women and the places and times for the designs more than other designs.

Schiller's 'Beautiful Soul' and Kant and Shaftesbury ("실러의 칸트 수용과 '아름다운 영혼' 그리고 샤프츠베리")

  • Kim, Joo-whee
    • Journal of Korean Philosophical Society
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    • v.148
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    • pp.101-128
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    • 2018
  • While there are various opinions about the relationship of Schiller's thought and Kant's, it is undeniable that Schiller owes much to Kant. What distinguished Schiller from other Weimar thinkers at his time, such as Goethe, Herder and Wieland, was that unlike them Schiller accepted Kant's project of critical philosophy. In fact, Schiller did not just accept it, but tried to interpret and formulate anew the relation of beauty and morality and some other aesthetical-ethical ideals on the basis of the new philosophy. Schiller's famous project of 'aesthetic education of mankind' itself is the product of such an endeavor. In this work we follow the history of Schiller's acceptance of Kant's critical philosophy and ruminate over its implications. And then, we'll show that Schiller's 'beautiful soul' in Grace and Dignity (1793), which is often suggested to be a proof of Schiller's conflict with Kant, was understood on the basis of Kant's moral theory. In this part of the work, we compare Schiller's ideal of the 'beautiful soul' and Shaftesbury's ethical thought, which is often presumed to be its background. From this comparison we'll be able to see that there is a considerable disparity, despite apparent similarities, between Schiller's and Shaftesbury's ethical ideals, which is due to their respective philosophical sources, that is neo-platonic metaphysics and Kant's critical philosophy.

The Hyper-real Body in Fashion Magazines (현대 패션잡지에 나타난 하이퍼리얼 바디)

  • Lee, Young-Hee;Yim, Eun-Hyuk
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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    • v.36 no.7
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    • pp.663-676
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    • 2012
  • This article is to understand the implications and ideological meaning of female normative beauty reproduced by the idealizing phenomena of the hyper-real body as a process of the normalization of the body projected in fashion magazines with a focus on the body created by the increased influence of mass media in consumer capitalism. This study conducts a literature research and semiotic analysis as the method of investigation and focuses on the body images of the beauty articles in Vogue Korea. The idealizing phenomena of the hyper-real body in fashion magazines emphasizes that the body is an exchangeable substance that can be disassembled to adjust to accord with the standards and norms of society, that the ability of individuals to manage their body is enhanced by a rise in social class, and concludes that the superficial alteration of the body image is related to the standard of a moral tendency where a young and slender figure is considered to be a well managed body image.

Thoughts on'dogu' Aesthetics (부통도구조식론 (1) 조선시대 여성과 여성신변신구에 나타난 미적 가치탐구를 중심으로)

  • 조재경
    • Archives of design research
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    • v.11 no.1
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    • pp.259-268
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    • 1998
  • Ideals of beauty has expressed variously through the centuries and in different cultures. Each traditional 'togu' has it's own morphology (in the meaning of nonverval linguistic) as using various type of language in each cultural erea. Korean aesthetics on 'dogu'philosophy introduces a whole new set of basic concepts outside western aesthetic framework of beauty Most distinctive is the insistence on overcoming dichotomies, especially between cognition and emotion, (momism)body and mind, self and other, and individual and group. Several topics are particularly illuminating within aesthetics: furniture, calligraphy, traditional garments pose interesting challenging to the art/nature, inside/outside, ethics/desire dichotomies so crucial to moral and cultural context. aesthetics are equally deserving of philosophical scrutiny: the ways in which philosophy of 'dogu'and aesthetics are integrated with daily life, the emphasis on process or understanding context rather than product itself or product 'form'. Dogu did not separate daily life and aesthetics from understanding social context. Language of 'togu' also has own vocabulary and grammar. But we often cannot gain our persnol experience truthful beauty of togu until understand context of understanding. it would be immpossible to explain ,or to analize different way of thinkings and behaivor precisly without understanding same codes of language.

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Roman Polansky's Tess: Aesthetics of Human Body and Capital (로만 폴란스키의 <테스>: 육체와 자본의 미학)

  • Kim, Bong Eun
    • English & American cultural studies
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    • v.9 no.1
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    • pp.71-90
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    • 2009
  • David Harris argues that mass media suppress counter-hegemonic factors in order to reach audience. According to Harris's theory, the success of the film "Tess" depends on its effective adaptation from Thomas Hardy's novel Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891). Tess (1979), directed by Roman Polansky, casting Nastassia Kinski for Tess, was acclaimed as a professional and commercial success, awarded with various prizes. Hardy's aim at criticizing Victorian English social and moral standard through Tess appears obscure in Polansky's film which focuses on the aesthetics of human body and capital. Polanski's Tess with urban white beauty does not emerge victimized by poverty, which the late twentieth century audience under the capitalist umbrella may abhor. To examine his use of music, sound effect, visual images by means of camera operation—angles, distances, close-ups and frequent movements—light and color, and mythic elements in the film, show Polansky's sharp perception of his contemporary audience's desire and conscientious work upon it.