ARCHITECTURE

ARCHITECTUREIntroduction to Humanities

The Humanities Through The Arts

ARCHITECTURE

• Buildings are works of art – that is architecture.

• Buildings possess artistic quality -- they make our living space more livable.

• They draw us to them rather than push us away or make us ignore them.

• They make our living space more livable.

Centered Space

• Centered space is the positioned interrelationships of things organized around some paramount thing as the place to which the other things seem to converge.

• Space is the material of the architect• Centered space has a pulling power that, even

in our most harassed moments, we can hardly help feeling.

Space and Architecture

• Architecture as opposed to mere engineering -- is the creative conservation of space.

• Architects perceive the centers of space in nature, and build to preserve these centers and make them more vital.

• Architects are the shepherds of space.

Chartres

• Chartres, like most Gothic churches, is shaped roughly like a recumbent Latin cross: p149 or 156 Fig 6-2 & 6-3

• The apse ( a projecting semicircular and vaulted part of a building) or eastern end of the building contains the high altar.

• The nave (the central part of a church running lengthwise) is the central and largest aisle leading from the central portal to the high alter.

• But before the altar is reached, the transept crosses the nave. Both the northern and southern facades of the transept of chartres contain glorious rose windows.

Living Space

• Living space is the feeling of the positioning of things in the environment, the liberty of movement, and the appeal of paths as directives.

• Space infiltrates through all our senses, as our sensations of everything influence our perception of space.

Living Space cont’d

• Each of our senses helps record the positioning of things, expressed in such terms as “up-down,” “left-right,” and near-far.”

• These recordings require a reference system with a center.

• With living space, since all the senses are involved, the whole body is a center.

Cont’d

• when we relate to a place of special value, such as the home,

• , a “configurational center” is formed in a place that is a gathering point around which a field of interest is structured.

• To oversimplify we can say that for Romans, it was the city of Rome to which they most naturally belong, constituting their configurational center.

Four Necessities of Architecture

• The architect’s professional life is perhaps more difficult than that of any other artist.

• Architecture is a peculiarly public art because buildings generally have a social function, and many buildings require public funds.

• More than other artists, the architects must consider the public.


• Thus architects must be psychologists, sociologists, economists, businesspeople, politicians, and courtiers.

• They must also be engineers, for they must be able to construct structurally stable buildings.

• Architects have to take into account four basic and closely interrelated necessities: technical requirements, use, spatial relationships, and content.


• Of the four necessities, the technical requirements of a building are the most obvious.

• Buildings must stand (and withstand). Architects must know the material and their potentialities, how to put the materials together,

• and how the materials will work on a particular site. So architects are engineers.

• But they are something more as well - artists.


• Functional Requirements of Architecture• Architects must not only make their buildings

stand but also usually stand them in such a way that they reveal their function or use.

• Some believe that (form must follow function).• If form follows function in the sense that the form

stands “for” the function; of its building, then conventional forms or structures are often sufficient. No one is likely to mistake Chartres Cathedral for an office building.


• Spatial Requirements of Architecture

• A building that is technically awry with poor lighting or awkward passageways or cramped rooms will distract from any artistic meaning,

• and so usually will a form that fails to reveal the function of its building, or a form that fails to fit into its spatial context.


• Revelatory Requirements of Architecture

• The function or use of a building is an essential part of the subject matter of that building,

• what the architect interprets or gives insight into by means of his form.


• Essential values of contemporary society are a part of all artists’ subject matter; part of what they must interpret in their work, and this--because of the public character of architecture--is especially so with architects.

• The way architects (and artists generally) are influenced by the values of their society has been given many explanations.

• To participate with a work of public architecture fully, we must have as complete an understanding as possible of its subject matter - - the function of the building and the relevant values of the society which subsidized the building. p.162 / p168

• Works of architecture separate an inside space from an outside space.

• They make that inside space available for human functions.

• And in interpreting their subject matter (functions and their society’s values), architects make space “space.”

• They bring out the power and embrace of the positioned interrelationships of things.

• Architecture in this respect can be divided into four main types:

• 1) the earth-rooted, 2) the sky-oriented,3) the earth-resting, and 4. earth-dominating architecture.

Earth-Rooted Architecture

• The earth is the securing agency that grounds the place of our existence, our center.

• No other thing exposes its surface more pervasively and yet hides its depth dimension more completely.

• Architecture that is earth-rooted discloses the earth by drawing our attention to the site of the building or to its submission to gravity, or to its raw materials, or to its centrality in outer and inner space.

Sky-Oriented Architecture

• Such architecture discloses a world by drawing our attention to the sky bounded by a horizon.

• It accomplishes this by means of making a building appear high and centered within the sky, defying gravity, and tightly integrating the light of outer with inner space.

Earth-Resting Architecture

• Most architecture accents neither earth nor sky but rests on the earth,

• using the earth like a platform with the sky as background.

• With earth-resting architecture - unlike earth-rooted architecture--the earth does not appear as an organic part of the building. Rather, the earth appears as a stage.

Earth-Dominating Architecture

• An earth-dominating building does not sit on (like earth-resting) but “rules over” the earth.

• Earth-dominating buildings generally are easily identified.

• Usually earth-dominating buildings are large and massive, but those features do not necessarily express earth-dominance.

Urban Planning• No use of space has become more critical

in our time than in the city.

• Therefore, the issues about space and architecture take on a special relevance with respect to city planning.

Urban Planning

• Most cities are planned either sporadically in segments or not at all.

• Some cities have height restrictions and in some cases top stories have been removed from buildings in construction.

• Some tall buildings create dark streets in the middle of the day. Is it possible to make the city a place to dwell?

Humanities • The humanities are academic disciplines which study the human

condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural and social sciences.

• Examples of the disciplines of the humanities are ancient and modern languages, literature, law, history, philosophy, religion, and visual and performing arts (including music and theatre). Additional subjects sometimes included in the humanities are technology, anthropology, area studies, communication studies, cultural studies, and linguistics, although these are often regarded as social sciences. Scholars working in the humanities are sometimes described as "humanists". However, that term also describes the philosophical position of humanism, which some "antihumanist" scholars in the humanities reject.

Humanities fields• Classics

• The classics, in the Western academic tradition, refer to cultures of classical antiquity, namely the Ancient Greek and Roman cultures. The study of the classics is considered one of the cornerstones of the humanities; however, its popularity declined during the 20th century. Nevertheless, the influence of classical ideas in many humanities disciplines, such as philosophy and literature, remains strong.

• Outside of its traditional and academic meaning, the "classics" can be understood as including foundational writings from other major cultures. In other traditions, classics would refer to the Hammurabi Code and the Gilgamesh Epic from Mesopotamia, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the Vedas and Upanishads in India and various writings attributed to Confucius, Lao-tse and Chuang-tzu in China.

• History

• History is systematically collected information about the past. When used as the name of a field of study, history refers to the study and interpretation of the record of humans, societies, institutions, and any topic that has changed over time. Knowledge of history is often said to encompass both knowledge of past events and historical thinking skills.

• Traditionally, the study of history has been considered a part of the humanities. In modern academia, history is occasionally classified as a social science.

• Languages• The study of individual modern and classical languages forms the backbone

of modern study of the humanities.

• While the scientific study of language is known as linguistics and is a social science, the study of languages is still central to the humanities. A good deal of twentieth-century and twenty-first-century philosophy has been devoted to the analysis of language and to the question of whether, as Wittgenstein claimed, many of our philosophical confusions derive from the vocabulary we use; literary theory has explored the rhetorical, associative, and ordering features of language; and historians have studied the development of languages across time. Literature, covering a variety of uses of language including prose forms (such as the novel), poetry and drama, also lies at the heart of the modern humanities curriculum. College-level programs in a foreign language usually include study of important works of the literature in that language, as well as the language itself.

• Law• In common parlance, law means a rule which (unlike a rule of ethics) is capable of

enforcement through institutions.[1] The study of law crosses the boundaries between the social sciences and humanities, depending on one's view of research into its objectives and effects. Law is not always enforceable, especially in the international relations context. It has been defined as a "system of rules",[2] as an "interpretive concept"[3] to achieve justice, as an "authority"[4] to mediate people's interests, and even as "the command of a sovereign, backed by the threat of a sanction".[5] However one likes to think of law, it is a completely central social institution. Legal policy incorporates the practical manifestation of thinking from almost every social science and discipline of the humanities. Laws are politics, because politicians create them. Law is philosophy, because moral and ethical persuasions shape their ideas. Law tells many of history's stories, because statutes, case law and codifications build up over time. And law is economics, because any rule about contract, tort, property law, labour law, company law and many more can have long lasting effects on the distribution of wealth. The noun law derives from the late Old English lagu, meaning something laid down or fixed[6] and the adjective legal comes from the Latin word lex.

• Literature

• Shakespeare wrote some of the greatest acclaimed works in English literature.

• "Literature" is a highly ambiguous term: at its broadest, it can mean any sequence of words that has been preserved for transmission in some form or other (including oral transmission); more narrowly, it is often used to designate imaginative works such as stories, poems, and plays; more narrowly still, it is used as an honorific and applied only to those works which are considered to have particular merit.

• Performing arts

• The performing arts differ from the plastic arts insofar as the former uses the artist's own body, face, and presence as a medium, and the latter uses materials such as clay, metal, or paint, which can be molded or transformed to create some art object. Performing arts include acrobatics, busking, comedy, dance, magic, music, opera, film, juggling, marching arts, such as brass bands, and theatre.

• Artists who participate in these arts in front of an audience are called performers, including actors, comedians, dancers, musicians, and singers. Performing arts are also supported by workers in related fields, such as songwriting and stagecraft. Performers often adapt their appearance, such as with costumes and stage makeup, etc. There is also a specialized form of fine art in which the artists perform their work live to an audience. This is called Performance art. Most performance art also involves some form of plastic art, perhaps in the creation of props. Dance was often referred to as a plastic art during the Modern dance era.

• Music

• Music as an academic discipline can take a number of different paths, including music performance, music education (training music teachers), musicology, music theory and composition. Undergraduate music majors generally take courses in all of these areas, while graduate students focus on a particular path. In the liberal arts tradition, music is also used to broaden skills of non-musicians by teaching skills such as concentration and listening.

• Theatre

• Theatre (or theater) (Greek "theatron", θέατρον) is the branch of the performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an audience using combinations of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound and spectacle — indeed any one or more elements of the other performing arts. In addition to the standard narrative dialogue style, theatre takes such forms as opera, ballet, mime, kabuki, classical Indian dance, Chinese opera, mummers' plays, and pantomime.

• Dance

• Dance (from Old French dancier, perhaps from Frankish) generally refers to human movement either used as a form of expression or presented in a social, spiritual or performance setting. Dance is also used to describe methods of non-verbal communication (see body language) between humans or animals (bee dance, mating dance), and motion in inanimate objects (the leaves danced in the wind). Choreography is the art of making dances, and the person who does this is called a choreographer.

• Definitions of what constitutes dance are dependent on social, cultural, aesthetic, artistic, and moral constraints and range from functional movement (such as Folk dance) to codified, virtuoso techniques such as ballet. In sports, gymnastics, figure skating and synchronized swimming are dance disciplines while Martial arts 'kata' are often compared to dances.

• Philosophy• • The works of Søren Kierkegaard overlap into many fields of the humanities, such as philosophy,

literature, theology, psychology, music, and classical studies.

• Philosophy — etymologically, the "love of wisdom"--is generally the study of problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, justification, truth, justice, right and wrong, beauty, validity, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing these issues by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on reasoned argument, rather than experiments (Experimental philosophy being an exception).[8]

• Philosophy used to be a very comprehensive term, including what have subsequently become separate disciplines, such as physics. (As Immanuel Kant noted, "Ancient Greek philosophy was divided into three sciences: physics, ethics, and logic.")[9] Today, the main fields of philosophy are logic, ethics, metaphysics, and epistemology. Still, there continues to be plenty of overlap with other disciplines; the field of semantics, for example, brings philosophy into contact with linguistics.

• Since the early twentieth century, the philosophy done in universities (especially in the English-speaking parts of the world) has become much more analytic. Analytic philosophy is marked by a clear, rigorous method of inquiry that emphasizes the use of logic and more formal methods of reasoning.[10] This method of inquiry is largely indebted to the work of philosophers such as Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, G.E. Moore, and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

• Religion

• The compass in this 13th century manuscript is a symbol of God's act of creation.• Most historians trace the beginnings of religious belief to the Neolithic Period.[citation

needed] Most religious belief during this time period consisted of worship of a Mother Goddess, a Sky Father, and also worship of the Sun and the Moon as deities. (see also Sun worship)[citation needed]

• New philosophies and religions arose in both east and west, particularly around the 6th century BC. Over time, a great variety of religions developed around the world, with Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism in India, Zoroastrianism in Persia being some of the earliest major faiths. In the east, three schools of thought were to dominate Chinese thinking until the modern day. These were Taoism, Legalism, and Confucianism. The Confucian tradition, which would attain predominance, looked not to the force of law, but to the power and example of tradition for political morality. In the west, the Greek philosophical tradition, represented by the works of Plato and Aristotle, was diffused throughout Europe and the Middle East by the conquests of Alexander of Macedon in the 4th century BC.

• Abrahamic religions are those religions deriving from a common ancient Semitic tradition and traced by their adherents to Abraham (circa 1900 BCE), a patriarch whose life is narrated in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, where he is described as a prophet (Genesis 20:7), and in the Quran, where he also appears as a prophet. This forms a large group of related largely monotheistic religions, generally held to include Judaism, Christianity, and Islam comprises over half of the world's religious adherents.

• Visual arts

• Quatrain on Heavenly Mountain by Emperor Gaozong (1107–1187) of Song Dynasty; fan mounted as album leaf on silk, four columns in cursive script.

• The great traditions in art have a foundation in the art of one of the ancient civilizations, such as Ancient Japan, Greece and Rome, China, India, Mesopotamia and Mesoamerica.

• Ancient Greek art saw a veneration of the human physical form and the development of equivalent skills to show musculature, poise, beauty and anatomically correct proportions. Ancient Roman art depicted gods as idealized humans, shown with characteristic distinguishing features (e.g., Zeus' thunderbolt).

• In Byzantine and Gothic art of the Middle Ages, the dominance of the church insisted on the expression of biblical and not material truths. The Renaissance saw the return to valuation of the material world, and this shift is reflected in art forms, which show the corporeality of the human body, and the three-dimensional reality of landscape.

• Eastern art has generally worked in a style akin to Western medieval art, namely a concentration on surface patterning and local colour (meaning the plain colour of an object, such as basic red for a red robe, rather than the modulations of that colour brought about by light, shade and reflection). A characteristic of this style is that the local colour is often defined by an outline (a contemporary equivalent is the cartoon). This is evident in, for example, the art of India, Tibet and Japan.

• Religious Islamic art forbids iconography, and expresses religious ideas through geometry instead. The physical and rational certainties depicted by the 19th-century Enlightenment were shattered not only by new discoveries of relativity by Einstein[11] and of unseen psychology by Freud,[12] but also by unprecedented technological development. Increasing global interaction during this time saw an equivalent influence of other cultures into Western art.

• Media types

• Drawing is a means of making an image, using any of a wide variety of tools and techniques. It generally involves making marks on a surface by applying pressure from a tool, or moving a tool across a surface. Common tools are graphite pencils, pen and ink, inked brushes, wax color pencils, crayons, charcoals, pastels, and markers. Digital tools which simulate the effects of these are also used. The main techniques used in drawing are: line drawing, hatching, crosshatching, random hatching, scribbling, stippling, and blending. An artist who excels in drawing is referred to as a draftsman or draughtsman.

• Painting

• Painting taken literally is the practice of applying pigment suspended in a carrier (or medium) and a binding agent (a glue) to a surface (support) such as paper, canvas or a wall. However, when used in an artistic sense it means the use of this activity in combination with drawing, composition and other aesthetic considerations in order to manifest the expressive and conceptual intention of the practitioner. Painting is also used to express spiritual motifs and ideas; sites of this kind of painting range from artwork depicting mythological figures on pottery to The Sistine Chapel to the human body itself.

• Colour is the essence of painting as sound is of music. Colour is highly subjective, but has observable psychological effects, although these can differ from one culture to the next. Black is associated with mourning in the West, but elsewhere white may be. Some painters, theoreticians, writers and scientists, including Goethe, Kandinsky, Isaac Newton, have written their own colour theory. Moreover the use of language is only a generalization for a colour equivalent. The word "red", for example, can cover a wide range of variations on the pure red of the spectrum. There is not a formalized register of different colours in the way that there is agreement on different notes in music, such as C or C# in music, although the Pantone system is widely used in the printing and design industry for this purpose.

• Modern artists have extended the practice of painting considerably to include, for example, collage. This began with cubism and is not painting in strict sense. Some modern painters incorporate different materials such as sand, cement, straw or wood for their texture. Examples of this are the works of Jean Dubuffet or Anselm Kiefer. Modern and contemporary art has moved away from the historic value of craft in favour of concept; this has led some to say that painting, as a serious art form, is dead, although this has not deterred the majority of artists from continuing to practise it either as whole or part of their work.

History of the humanitie

• In the West, the study of the humanities can be traced to ancient Greece, as the basis of a broad education for citizens. During Roman times, the concept of the seven liberal arts evolved, involving grammar, rhetoric and logic (the trivium), along with arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music (the quadrivium).[13] These subjects formed the bulk of medieval education, with the emphasis being on the humanities as skills or "ways of doing."

• A major shift occurred with the Renaissance humanism of the fifteenth century, when the humanities began to be regarded as subjects to be studied rather than practiced, with a corresponding shift away from the traditional fields into areas such as literature and history. In the 20th century, this view was in turn challenged by the postmodernist movement, which sought to redefine the humanities in more egalitarian terms suitable for a democratic society.[14]

• In the digital age

• Researchers in the humanities have developed numerous large and small scale digital corpora, such as digitized collections of historical texts, along with the digital tools and methods to analyze them. Their aim is both to uncover new knowledge about corpora and to visualize research data in new and revealing ways. The field where much of this activity occurs is called the Digital Humanities.

• Legitimation of the humanities

• Compared to the growing numbers of undergraduates enrolled in private and public post-secondary institutions, the percentage of enrollments and majors in the humanities is shrinking, although overall enrollment in the humanities expressed in actual numbers has not significantly changed (and by some measurements has actually increased slightly).[20]

• The modern "crisis" facing humanities scholars in the university is multifaceted: universities in the United States in particular have adopted corporate guidelines requiring profit both from undergraduate education and from academic scholarship and research, resulting in an increased demand for academic disciplines to justify their existence based on the applicability of their disciplines to the world outside of the university. Increasing corporate emphasis on "life-long learning" has also impacted the university’s role as educator and researcher.[21] Responses to those changing institutional norms, and to changing emphasis on what constitutes "useful skills" in an increasingly technological world, have varied greatly both inside and outside of the university system.

• Citizenship, self-reflection, and the humanities

• Since the late 19th century, a central justification for the Humanities has been that it aids and encourages self-reflection, a self-reflection which in turn helps develop personal consciousness and/or an active sense of civic duty.

• Wilhelm Dilthey and Hans-Georg Gadamer centered the humanities’ attempt to distinguish itself from the natural sciences in humankind’s urge to understand its own experiences. This understanding, they claimed, ties like-minded people from similar cultural backgrounds together and provides a sense of cultural continuity with the philosophical past.[22]

• Scholars in the late 20th and early 21st centuries extended that “narrative imagination”[23] to the ability to understand the records of lived experiences outside of one’s own individual social and cultural context. Through that narrative imagination, it is claimed, humanities scholars and students develop a conscience more suited to the multicultural world in which we live.[24] That conscience might take the form of a passive one that allows more effective self-reflection[25] or extend into active empathy which facilitates the dispensation of civic duties in which a responsible world citizen must engage.[24] There is disagreement, however, on the level of impact humanities study can have on an individual and whether or not the understanding produced in humanistic enterprise can guarantee an “identifiable positive effect on people.”[26]

• Truth, meaning, and the humanities

• The divide between humanistic study and natural sciences informs arguments of meaning in humanities as well. What distinguishes the humanities from the natural sciences is not a certain subject matter, but rather the mode of approach to any question. Humanities focuses on understanding meaning, purpose, and goals and furthers the appreciation of singular historical and social phenomena—an interpretive method of finding “truth”—rather than explaining the causality of events or uncovering the truth of the natural world.[27] Apart from its societal application, narrative imagination is an important tool in the (re)production of understood meaning in history, culture and literature.

• Imagination, as part of the tool kit of artists or scholars, serves as vehicle to create meaning which invokes a response from an audience. Since a humanities scholar is always within the nexus of lived experiences, no "absolute" knowledge is theoretically possible; knowledge is instead a ceaseless procedure of inventing and reinventing the context in which a text is read. Poststructuralism has problematized an approach to the humanistic study based on questions of meaning, intentionality, and authorship.[dubious – discuss] In the wake of the death of the author proclaimed by Roland Barthes, various theoretical currents such as deconstruction and discourse analysis seek to expose the ideologies and rhetoric operative in producing both the purportedly meaningful objects and the hermeneutic subjects of humanistic study. This exposure has opened up the interpretive structures of the humanities to criticism humanities scholarship is “unscientific” and therefore unfit for inclusion in modern university curricula because of the very nature of its changing contextual meaning.[dubious – di

• Pleasure, the pursuit of knowledge, and humanities scholarship

• Some, like Stanley Fish, have claimed that the humanities can defend themselves best by refusing to make any claims of utility.[28] (Fish may well be thinking primarily of literary study, rather than history and philosophy.) Any attempt to justify the humanities in terms of outside benefits such as social usefulness (say increased productivity) or in terms of ennobling effects on the individual (such as greater wisdom or diminished prejudice) is ungrounded, according to Fish, and simply places impossible demands on the relevant academic departments. Furthermore, critical thinking, while arguably a result of humanistic training, can be acquired in other contexts.[21] And the humanities do not even provide any more the kind of social cachet (what sociologists sometimes call "cultural capital") that was helpful to succeed in Western society before the age of mass education following World War II.

• Instead, scholars like Fish suggest that the humanities offer a unique kind of pleasure, a pleasure based on the common pursuit of knowledge (even if it is only disciplinary knowledge). Such pleasure contrasts with the increasing privatization of leisure and instant gratification characteristic of Western culture; it thus meets Jürgen Habermas’ requirements for the disregard of social status and rational problematization of previously unquestioned areas necessary for an endeavor which takes place in the bourgeois public sphere. In this argument, then, only the academic pursuit of pleasure can provide a link between the private and the public realm in modern Western consumer society and strengthen that public sphere which, according to many theorists, is the foundation for modern democracy.

• Romanticization and rejection of the humanities

• Implicit in many of these arguments supporting the humanities are the makings of arguments against public support of the humanities. Joseph Carroll asserts that we live in a changing world, a world in which "cultural capital" is being replaced with "scientific literacy" and in which the romantic notion of a Renaissance humanities scholar is obsolete. Such arguments appeal to judgments and anxieties about the essential uselessness of the humanities, especially in an age when it is seemingly vitally important for scholars of literature, history and the arts to engage in "collaborative work with experimental scientists" or even simply to make "intelligent use of the findings from empirical science."[29] The notion that 'in today's day and age,' with its focus on the ideals of efficiency and practical utility, scholars of the humanities are becoming obsolete was perhaps summed up most powerfully in a remark that has been attributed to the artificial intelligence specialist Marvin Minsky: “With all the money that we are throwing away on humanities and art - give me that money and I will build you a better student."[30]

• Minsky's faith in the superiority of technical knowledge and his reduction of the humanities scholar of today to an obsolete relic of the past supported by the tax dollars of romantics fondly recalling the days of the G.I. Bill echoes arguments put forth by scholars and cultural commentators that call themselves "post-humanists" or "transhumanists." The idea is that current trends in the scientific understanding of human beings are calling the basic category of "the human" into question. Examples of these trends are assertions by cognitive scientists that the mind is simply a computing device, by geneticists that human beings are no more than ephemeral husks used by self-propagating genes (or even memes, according to some postmodern linguists), or by bioengineers who claim that one day it may be both possible and desirable to create human-animal hybrids[citation needed]. Rather than engage with old-style humanist scholarship, transhumanists in particular tend to be more concerned with testing and altering the limits of our mental and physical capacities in fields such as cognitive science and bioengineering in order to transcend the essentially bodily limitations that have bounded humanity. Despite the criticism of humanities scholarship as obsolete, however, many of the most influential post-humanist works are profoundly engaged with film and literary criticism, history, and cultural studies as can be seen in the writings of Donna Haraway and N. Katherine Hayles. And in recent years there has been a spate of books and articles re-articulating the importance of humanistic study. Examples include: Harold Bloom, How to Read and Why (2001), Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, Production of Presence (2004), Frank B. Farrell, Why Does Literature Matter? (2004), John Carey, What Good Are the Arts? (2006), Lisa Zunshine, Why We Read Fiction (2006), Alexander Nehamas, Only A Promise Of Happiness (2007), Rita Felski, Uses of Literature (2008).

A FEW WORDS ABOUT Arts & Humanities CATEGORY

• Art takes our normal everyday existence and turns it into a life of joy and enrichment. There are so many things that enliven our thoughts. Everything from the classical arts like literature and humanities, to the pop arts like animation, comics, and design. Culture in the form of performing arts like movies, television, and theater. And the finer arts like history, education and museums.

• The arts directory is also a resource for those creating and participating in the development of art. Sections on graphic design (everything from fans, to samples to learning), architecture (historical vs. modern, clients vs. designers, form vs. function), visual arts (cartooning, design, technical proficiency), technical writing (finding gigs and finding resources), typography and writers resources categorized for easy search. Professional sections on video (homemade, professional, careers), rhetoric, photography (amateur, professional, film vs. digital), and organizations for those seeking important resources. And lastly, sections on arts education, and ethnic & gender studies.

• Popular sections include divisions on body art (from tattoos to piercings), and participatory sections like forums, blogs, and chat areas to form communities of like interested individuals in the pursuit of their artistic bent.

• A directory of the arts would be incomplete without including sections on consumers of art. A major section on comedy (movies, television, theater, radio), literature (classical, novels, short stories, and poetry), art listings (museums, shows and galleries).

• A robust section on antiques. Everything from furniture & jewelry, to shops and store and other places to purchase items, to techniques and sites for finding and restoring old items.

• Finally, there is a section of work divided by genre. Your search may begin with something as simple as 'horror' or 'comedy' or 'western' and a world of possibilities is introduced from this major topic. Art is often divided by period and this directory cross-references with the recognized historical periods

• The arts directory is a collection of cross-functional categories for everything one could possibly want in their artistic pursuit. Whether as a creative force, a fan or anything in between, the arts directory has the major categories of interest followed by subdivisions of like interest.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT Arts & Humanities : Architecture

CATEGORY• Architecture is perhaps one of the most perceived forms of all the arts. From The pyramids in Egypt to skyscrapers in New York civilizations throughout time have defined

themselves and have been defined by architecture. More than shelter, more than houses or offices or buildings, architecture is the definition of humanity.

• From the earliest cavemen to the modern urbanite we live, work and play in the structures we create. Architecture throughout history has sought to enrich our lives by designing beautiful and extraordinary structures. In this web directory you will find a comprehensive listing of architecture, spanning all aspects of the field.

• Modern architecture has broadened its scope, encompassing not only traditional forms of structural design, but now defines landscapes, urban design, city planning, furniture and even sculpture. Both traditional architecture and modern works can be found in this web directory along with information regarding famous designers and architects in the field.

• Arthitecture has occured when the humanity felt the need of a shelter, of a place where they could feel confortable, without worrying about rain or windy weather. Back then, architecture meant for our ancestors only carving holes into the caves and using animal leather to upholster the walls, but nowadays architecture has become far more complex than that. When we talk about architecture, we think of houses that come in all shape and sizes, along with breath-taking buildings that seem endless. This shows the evolution of the human kind in the architectural domain.

• Humanity is continuously growing when it comes to both architecture and arts. We begin to expand it all over the world, some of the most concludent examples of how inventive the humanity has become would be the Eiffel Tour in Paris or Sagrada Famiglia in Barcelona. These are indeed masterpieces, works of art created by skillful architects. And yet, this is only the beginning of an era in which architecture transposes in reality thoughts, ideas and images that once people only dared to dream of.

• The materials used for ancient architecture were simple ones found in nature without needing to process them in any way, such as wood or rock. Architecture nowadays supposes more than just simple elements, we use steel and metal to ensure the solid structure of buildings, while roofs are made of high quality ceramic tiles for example, and windows aim to complete the aesthetic look of your home.

• Traditional design in architecture focused heavily on form and function, relying on the basic elements of design to create useful and beautiful buildings. Modern architecture on the other hand has been able to expand its desires. Innovations in technology and materials along with a growing love for non traditional forms in the design world has led to a much different style of architecture then previously known.

• Curves, domes and organic shapes never before possible, or wanted, have found their way into some of the most famous architectural buildings in the World. From the Sydney Opera house in Australia to the Guggenheim museum in New York architecture has become something far greater then simple shelter construction. Architecture is the joining of art and engineering.

• With Modern materials, creative designers and a willingness to explore, Architecture has, and will design the world around us.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT Arts & Humanities : Performing

CATEGORY

• Among the fields of the Arts and Humanities perhaps none is more specialized then the performing arts. From singers, musicians and actors to comedians and writers, the performing arts cover a wide range of skills and abilities generally described by their unifying characteristic, interacting with an audience. Performing has grown in modern times to be one of the most respected, and possible lucrative fields in the world with the birth of motion pictures.

• Performing captivates audiences, it enriches and entertains us. Performances have always been a means by which people socialize and connect. If you're a performer, you need to know where auditions are; you need to know where to go and when to do it. In this web directory you will find everything, from the earliest history of performing, to useful links connecting you with modern venues where performances take place.

• If you work in the performing area of arts and you are looking to recruit new talents for your company, why wasting your time browsing through thousands of pages until you find what you were looking for? You simply submit to this web directory and you will then be linked to the pages where artists, no matter if they are musicians, actors or singers are trying to find a way of performing for somebody. It is as easy as it seems!

• More than that, if you are a singer and you have a site where you promote your music and art, you can submit to this web directory and we will simply make it more popular. When you are a newcomer in the world of the performing art, it is quite hard to make yourself known and even attract people that could be interested in what you are doing.

• Since we offer you a wide range of links of venues, your chances are significantly increased. Also, if you are performing an act for instance and you are looking for a location where you can do your work just the way you like it, this web directory is the perfect choice because you can find more than one location so you will be able to compare them and see which one fits your needs best. This is the best place for performing artists to find what they were looking for.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT Arts & Humanities : Visual Arts

CATEGORY

• The visual arts have been the basis for the fields of the Arts and Humanities throughout time. Painting, drawing and sculpture are the most agreed upon subjects, while modern technology has expanded this description to include printing, writing, graphic design and motion pictures among others. Modern art has broadened our definition of art, so that even graffiti can be consider among the visual arts.

• Visual arts have changed forms greatly in the last two thousand years. Public opinion has influence the visual arts perhaps more than any other art form. Visual art is in your face, you see it and talk about it and share it. Visual art is perhaps one of the most important art forms because it communicates so well. Visual art has always been one of the most lasting forms of expression throughout time. Shape, form, color and texture help to define our world, and as visual being we understand our world by what we see more than any other means. Visual art takes advantage of this, using our understanding of the world to speak to us.

• Artists have used the visual arts for centuries to communicate ideas and thoughts. Some have been obvious, some have been discreet. No matter how an artist, or what an artist chooses to say through visual art, the message is the same. Visual art speaks to us, it says things people dare not say and shows us thing we would never think.

• It is said that a picture or a painting is worth more than a thousand words. It is true, because sometimes you can tell an entire story through visual arts, especially when it comes to photography. You just immortalize a moment and allow the visitor to create his own version of the story based on that photograph. This is why artists are so attracted to visual arts, they can express their thoughts and feelings just the way they want to, without any restraints.

• Nowadays, in the branch of visual arts that consists in paintings, painters use a special technique that creates the impression that you are being followed by the person portrayed in the painting. This is only one of the many proves that visual arts have become very complex and have evolved a lot since the cave paintings, said to be the first form of visual art. This web directory is meant to help artists from the field of visual art, providing them all the information they need. If you are looking for a place where you would like to hold an exhibition related to visual arts such as photography, this is the right place to do it.

• We offer you high quality information regarding locations, as well as other services related to advertising in order to attract more people that are interested in visual arts and make them take part at your gallery.

• Visual art explores our boundaries and defines our world. Classical art (fine art) has always been defined by the three major visual arts since ancient Greece. The visual arts have continued to inspired, to enrich and to expand our modern world. From the earliest history of visual arts such as the cave painting in Lascaux France, to everyday commercials on TV, you can find detailed information and links regarding the visual arts within this directory.

• History, research and news are just the tip of the iceberg in regards to the visual arts. If you're a visual artist, you can find the resource you need to develop your work here. From galleries to paint suppliers to community message boards this web directory is your tool to connect to the art world.

• The Visual arts are a means of communication, from photographs to paintings; artists from around the world express their ideas and opinions through the visual arts, and enrich the world around us. As an artist, or art lover this web directory can serve all your needs.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT Arts & Humanities : Crafts CATEGORY

• Crafts have always played a pivotal role in the history of art and design, from ancient times when crafts such as pottery and clothing were essential functions of daily life to the modern world where crafts have become object of luxury rather than necessity. There is a distinct difference between art and craft.

• Art doesn't necessarily have to fulfill a purpose; art can be beautiful and doesn't need a function. Craft on the other hand is tangible, physical, created with a purpose, from woven handbags to tradition woodworked furniture, crafts combine beauty with purpose. In ancient times the craftsman was one of the most respected and needed aspects of the community, having skills and knowledge to create "tools" that would allow people to work and live easier then without. After the industrial revolution, the perception of crafts changed. When objects and tools were no longer necessary to be made by hand, the role of the craftsmen became far more artistic.

• Although initially, crafts and craftsmen reffered strictly to items that were indispensable whether if we are talking about swords, armours or objects of pottery that were used as housewares, nowadays when we talk about crafts we reffer to objects that are used mostly in decorations, handmade articles that aim to boost the aesthetic look of your living room or give a bit of rural influence to your kitchen and do not have a particular usage.

• There are many sorts of crafts and there are people that make a living out of being craftsmen. On the other hand, everybody can do a craft, no matter if you are a child or an adult and you wish to relax.

• Dolls, arrases or simply handmade postards are crafts that brighten up anyone`s day and add a bit of colour in our lives. Handmade crafts are so wanted because when somebody manufactures them, they make them with all their heart, being something that they enjoy doing.

• Moreover, the custom of making crafts is often met in the rural zones, at the countries where both old people and children love to preserve traditions and so they transmit them from generation to generation, just like their parents and grandparents did. Some of the most known crafts made at the country side are wooden spoons manually carved or accessories such as bracelets, necklaces or flamboyant belts for the traditional costumes.

• Crafts began to focus on beauty and design, serving more as art then tool, though still as functional. This web directory contains helpful information in regards to the history of crafts, as well as resources and tools for those interested in crafts. Today, Craftsmen are highly skilled and sought after to produce unique one of a kind items. In today's modern world many people are beginning to prefer the more human side of crafts, choosing to buy and own handmade object in comparison to factory machined items.

• Because of this modern movement away from mass production crafts have become very popular once more, relying on the human factor in their creation. Crafts are produced from around the world and exported on an international market, helping to introduce people to cultures and art from around the globe. The art of crafts is wide ranging from furniture to jewelry, incorporating beauty with purpose crafts have been and always will be a vital part of the art world.

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