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our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting ngai our aesthetic categories takes up the mantle of adornos aesthetic theory and here ngai bes the leading cultural critic of our day. jonathan culler cornell university this worfully original book i hesitate to call it cute zany and interesting but that wouldnt be wrong inventsesh and incisive new categories for that tired old study called aesthetics.
our aesthetic categories sianne ngai harvard table of contents. the zany the cute and the interesting saturate postmrn culture. they dominate the look of its art andmodities as well as our discourse about the ambivalent feelings these objects often inspire. in this radiant study sianne ngai offers a theory of the aesthetic categories that most people use to process the hypemodified massmediated performancedriven world of late capitalism treating them with the same seriousness philosophers have reserved for analysis .

our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting by she is the author of ugly feelings and our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting winner of the mrn language associations james russell lowell prize. her work has been translated into multiple languages and she has received fellowshipsom the institute of advanced study in berlin and the american council of learned societies.

our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting by a brilliant work of theory conceptualizing three of our times dominant aesthetic categoriesthe cute the interesting the zanywhichpared to the beautiful and the sublime are allpervasive in everyday life and equivocal in the affects they summon.

our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting the zany cute and interesting are not postmrnitys only meaningful aesthetic categories ngai argues but the ones best suited for grasping the radical transformation of aesthetic experience and discourse ur its conditions. learn more on publishers website

zany cute interesting sianne ngai on our aesthetic zany cute interesting sianne ngai on our aesthetic categories. themodity aesthetic of cuteness the discursive aesthetic of the interesting and the performative aesthetic of zaniness help us get at some of the most important social dynamics urlying life in late capitalist society today.. the following is an excerptom the introduction to sianne ngais new book our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting.

the zany the cute and the interesting on ngais our our aesthetic categories is as much about the process of arriving at verdicts like cute zany and interesting as it is about the stylistic conventions that inspire us to make those.

sianne ngais our aesthetic categories zany cute in her new book our aesthetic categories zany cute interesting she consrs how those feelings help us form judgments about the aesthetic world how we know toscribe something as.

zany cute interesting what the words we use say about us it elicits a certain contempt. ngai associates it with other lite aesthetic categories promulgated by postwar consumer culture quaint wacky quirky cool. the cute is an infectious aesthetic.

our aesthetic categories an interview with sianne ngai the book im currentlypleting is on the contemporary significance of three aesthetic categories in particular the cute the interesting and the zany. i focus on aesthetic experiences groud in equivocal affects. in fact the aesthetic categories that interest me most are ones groud on feelings that explicitly clash.