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Fun With the Enlightenment. It is all around you, watching your every move. Basic Introduction. Intellectual movement of the 17 th and 18 th Centuries Influential in Britain and continent Affects art, philosophy, science, politics Celebration of reason Belief in progress. Just for fun.
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Fun With the Enlightenment It is all around you, watching your every move
Basic Introduction • Intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th Centuries • Influential in Britain and continent • Affects art, philosophy, science, politics • Celebration of reason • Belief in progress
Just for fun • Break up into three groups. • You will be assigned a scenario and a set of tasks. • Take fifteen minutes to work through the scenario • Be prepared to present your scenario and responses. • Just provide a basic response– not overly detailed.
The Enlightenment and Art • Emulation admiration of antiquity– values, aesthetics, philosophy, etc. • Emerges from development of the formal study of archaeology • Depiction of scenes/myths/stories from antiquity The Death of Socrates, Jacques-Louis David (1787) Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Enlightenment and Art Monticello (1772), Charlottesville, VA National Park Service Napoleon Crossing the Alps, Jacques-Louis David, 1801 Musée national du château de Malmaison, Rueil-Malmaison, France
The Enlightenment and Music • Baroque • Emphasis upon technical complexity • Importance of counterpoint • Repetition, variation, ornamentation of a main theme • Notion of cosmological importance of music • Interweaving of lines together J. S. Bach, Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 2, No. 16 in G Minor Earsense.org
Move to a new style– “classical” period • Dropped counterpoint and ornamentation • Galant style • Single melody with accompaniment • Emphasis upon lean and audible form to music • Music meant to be enjoyed, stripped of mystery Diagram of first movement of Mozart’s String Quartet No. 18 in G major, K 387, University of Florida
Enlightenment and Political Philosophy • English-- • Thomas Hobbes (human nature) • John Locke (social contract) • French– • Montesquieu (separation of powers) • Rousseau (popular sovereignty/ republicanism) Rembrandt Peale, Thomas Jefferson (1805) New York Historical Society
Take a break and think a bit • What would be the characteristics of an ideal absolute ruler? • Get in your groups from before and come up with a list of five traits
Enlightened Despotism • Philosopher kings • Suspicion of the masses among many Enlightenment types, i.e. Voltaire • Examples • Charles III of Spain • Frederick the Great of Prussia Anton Graff, Frederick the Great, c.a. 1780 SchloβCharlottenburg, Berlin
Enlightenment and Science • René Descartes • Francis Bacon and emergence of empiricism • Isaac Newton and modern physics • Emergence of learned societies/debating clubs/coffee houses • Meritocracy Godfrey Kneller, Sir Isaac Newton, 1702 National Portrait Gallery, London
Enlightenment and Religion • Results in a questioning of received knowledge • Weariness from wars of religion (Peace of Westphalia, 1648) • Emergence of deism • “Natural religion” • Connection to antiquity • Later: emergence of secularism Largillière, Voltaire, 1725 Palais de Versailles, France
Looking ahead • French Revolution • Liberté, égalité, fraternité • Reign of Terror • Nationalism • Connection-- UK • Citizenship-- France • Language, culture and belonging– Germany, Italy • Romanticism • Sturm and Drang • Beethoven • Coleridge Top: Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People (1830) Bottom: Turner, The Fighting Téméraire(1829)
Counter-Enlightenment • Reaction to the perceived excesses of the Enlightenment • Overemphasis upon reason • Counterrevolutionary • Set of values at tension with those of the Enlightenment into 20th Century
Modern Critics • Enlightenment science not disinterested but about making use of nature– exploitation • Development of modern bureaucratic state at expense of individual hand-in-glove with rationalism • Economic liberalism and its costs • Conquest and colonization– civilization v. uncivilized • Failure of the promise of progress