Touching Books: Diderot, Novalis,and the Encyclopedia of the Future

2011 ◽  
Vol 114 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chad Wellmon
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Future

This article considers the reinvention of the Enlightenment encyclopedic tradition in a late eighteenth-century Germany overwhelmed by the proliferation of print. In particular, it traces a shift in the very metaphors of encyclopedic knowledge from those of vision that characterized Diderot and D'Alembert's Encyclopédie to those of touch that characterized the German poet Novalis's Allgemeine Brouillon.

THE “HARD FORM” OF SCULPTURE: MARBLE, MATTER AND SPIRIT IN EUROPEAN SCULPTURE FROM THE ENLIGHTENMENT THROUGH ROMANTICISM

2008 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 455-486 ◽  
Author(s):  
LINDA WALSH
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
External Appearance ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
Familiar World ◽  
A Site ◽  
Aesthetic Values

The apparently distinct aesthetic values of naturalism (a fidelity to external appearance) and neoclassicism (with its focus on idealization and intangible essence) came together in creative tension and fusion in much late eighteenth-century and early nineteenth-century sculptural theory and practice. The hybrid styles that resulted suited the requirements of the European sculpture-buying public. Both aesthetics, however, created difficulties for the German Idealists who represented a particularly uncompromising strain of Romantic theory. In their view, naturalism was too closely bound to the observable, familiar world, while neoclassicism was too wedded to notions of clearly defined forms. This article explores sculptural practice and theory at this time as a site of complex debates around the medium's potential for specific concrete representation in a context of competing Romantic visions (ethereal, social and commercial) of modernity.

Land and Territory

2020 ◽  
pp. 142-163
Author(s):  
Nicola Miller
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Tropical Agriculture ◽  
Natural Phenomena ◽  
Tropical Fruits ◽  
Rare Element ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Future

This chapter explains that the arrival of lithography in the 1820s made it possible to illustrate printed matter with beautiful scenic engravings. It analyses the evocations of distinctive natural phenomena that constituted a rare element of continuity between the creole patriotism of the late eighteenth century and the post-independence debates about the future. It also discusses how utility and utopianism were enfolded into investigations of the biblical and secular paradise of American nature. The chapter cites how Bello's famous Ode to Tropical Agriculture summoned its audience to live out the freedom won by independence through working the soil, exhorting them not to let the prodigious bounty of tropical fruits lure them into sterile idleness. It mentions that the Argentine anthem mapped out the battlegrounds where liberty had been won, and the Chilean anthem celebrated the clarity of the sky, the tranquillity of the sea, and the majesty of the mountains.

5. Long Waves and Conjunctures of Democratization

2018 ◽  
pp. 67-81
Author(s):  
Dirk Berg-Schlosser
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Long Waves ◽  
Political Equality ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Long Wave ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of

This chapter focuses on the history of democratization since the late eighteenth century. It introduces the concepts of ‘waves’ (trends) and ‘conjunctures’ (briefer turmoils) and delineates the major developments in this respect. In this way, the major long-term and short-term factors leading to the emergence and breakdowns of democracies are also highlighted. The first long wave occurred during the period 1776–1914, followed by the first positive conjuncture in 1918–19, the second long wave (with some intermittent turbulences) in 1945–88, and the latest conjuncture in 1989–90. The chapter identifies the main ingredients to democratization throughout history, namely: republicanism, representation, and political equality. It concludes by considering some of the current perspectives and dangers for the future of democracy.

Are we Really Past Truth? A Historian’s Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-283
Author(s):  
Sophia Rosenfeld
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Public Life ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth

Abstract The prevalence of the term post-truth suggests that we have, in the last few years, moved from being members of societies dedicated to truth to being members of ones that cannot agree on truth’s parameters and, even worse, have given up trying. But is this really what has happened? The author argues that, under the sway of the Enlightenment, truth has actually been unstable and a source of contention in public life ever since the founding moment for modern democracies in the late eighteenth century; the ‘post’ in ‘post-truth’ elides this complex history even as it accurately describes some of the conditions of our moment. What that means, though, is that rather than attempt to turn the clock back to past models and practices for restoring the reign of truth, we should be looking for new, post-Enlightenment paradigms for how to define and locate truth in the context of democracy, as well as new mechanisms for making this possible.

Closer Still: The Total Artwork

Lyric Cousins ◽  
2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fiona Sampson
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Richard Wagner ◽  
Interior Decoration ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Future ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Late Twentieth Century

This chapter considers the Gesamtkunstwerk, which English musicologists translate as ‘total artwork’. Richard Wagner had used the expression to characterise his operas, though he had only ever used the term in two essays, both published in 1849: ‘Art and Revolution’ and ‘The Artwork of the Future’. Moreover, the term did not originate from Wagner himself, and he did not even spell it in the conventional way. Since the late twentieth century ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’ has been applied to other artforms, particularly architecture, which like opera can unite a number of elements. (Architecture, for example, marries engineering, landscaping and interior decoration, among others.) But the term's origins are in the late eighteenth-century notion that all the arts could be unified in poetry.

4. Long Waves and Conjunctures of Democratization

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirk Berg-Schlosser
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Long Waves ◽  
Political Equality ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Long Wave ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of

This chapter focuses on the history of democratization since the late eighteenth century. It introduces the concepts of ‘waves’ (trends) and ‘conjunctures’ (briefer turmoils) and delineates the major developments in this respect. In this way, the major long-term and short-term factors leading to the emergence and breakdowns of democracies are also highlighted. The first long wave occurred during the period 1776–1914, followed by the first positive conjuncture in 1918–19, the second long wave (with some intermittent turbulences) in 1945–88, and the latest conjuncture in 1989–90. The chapter identifies the main ingredients to democratization throughout history, namely: republicanism, representation, and political equality. It concludes by considering some of the current perspectives and dangers for the future of democracy.

Book Ownership in Late Eighteenth-Century Scotland: a Local Case Study of Dumfriesshire Inventories

2012 ◽  
Vol 91 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vivienne Dunstan
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Scottish Enlightenment ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Print Material ◽  
Local Case ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Scholarly Attention

Late eighteenth-century Scotland saw a period of growth in the availability of print material set against the backdrop of the Scottish Enlightenment. Yet despite much scholarly attention having been paid to the Enlightenment and an increasing interest in the books people were reading, little attention has been paid to the books that would have been found in individual Scottish houses and what they reveal about Scottish mindsets in these years. This paper addresses this topic, using a local case study of after-death inventories of personal possessions. These rich records reveal the size of household libraries, the varieties of books they contained, variation by occupation and social class, and the extent to which their owners engaged with and were influenced by debates and ideas of the time. In addition, the evidence allows us to consider the uses to which different types of books were put, examine differences between urban and provincial Scotland, and consider how and where people bought their books.

Amores perritos: Puppies, Laughter and Popular Catholicism in Bourbon Mexico City

2014 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
FRANK ‘TREY’ PROCTOR
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Mexico City ◽  
Colonial Mexico ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Face ◽  
Bourbon Reforms ◽  
Popular Classes

AbstractIn late eighteenth-century Mexico City, Spanish colonials, particularly members of the urban middle and popular classes, performed a number of weddings and baptisms on puppies (which were wearing clothes or bejewelled collars) in the context of fandangos or dance parties. These ceremonies were not radical challenges to orthodoxy or conservative reactions in the face of significant economic, political, religious and cultural Bourbon reforms emanating from Spain. Employing Inquisitorial investigations of these ceremonies, this article explores the rise of pet keeping, the meanings of early modern laughter and the implications of the cultural and religious components of the Enlightenment-inspired Bourbon reforms in late colonial Mexico.

scholarly journals Enlightenment or Counter-Enlightenment in Russia? Enlightenment or Counter-Enlightenment in Russia? Century

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 1089-1120
Author(s):  
Natalie Bayer
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
The Mind

The article explores the themes of Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment through the lens of Freemasonry, and, more specifically, Freemasons in Russia who wrote history. It tests the approaches of Masonic history writers against Berlin’s definitions of the Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment. Whilst a definitive break between the Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment seems attractive, the article advances a more nuanced picture of the plurality of religious and secular discourse in Russia. Instead of opposing the Enlightenment, many late eighteenth-century Masonic writers of history provided their own, alternative interpretative models of history as a way out of the perceived crisis between the mind and the soul.

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