I was nervous about this class at first, but now that I have an understand, it's not that bad. Media Aesthetics is basically the the study of beauty with the spoken/communicated word. This says that there is more to a written work than just the form and visual aspect.
The bible has very many visual aspect to it. Pictures were drawn on the pages to enhance the visual appeal. Since it was hard to read with the words so close together, they had to add alittle color and objects to make it more pleasing to the eye. The bible has come along way. Most bibles that have colorful pictures now, are bibles meant for little kids.
Beyond the visual aspect, you can look the structure of the written work. Chaucer's Canterbury Tales When one looks at the structure, usually one looks at the order of the tales. That is how each tale leads into the next. Some scholars believe that there is no structure between the tales and then there are some that do. I think to comes down to the saying "to each their own."
Briefly I'll touch base with Aesthetic Distance. This is the distance that the author creates between himself and the text or the reader and the text. The second way makes it possible for the reader to approach the text with an open mind and not take sides.
Finally, we looked a little at art. We looked at paintings associated with Pygmalion. We talked about how the paintings went with the myth. We used words to communicate the paintings. Then John Haddad showed a wide variety of art, ranging from paintings to statues. He communicated the beauty of the art that he had presented to us.
That's about it for my little sample of Media Aesthetics.
Posted by Rachel Howard at February 11, 2004 10:32 PM