Peter Kivy
Encyclopedia
Peter Kivy is a professor of philosophy at Rutgers University
. He studies aesthetics
and the philosophy of art, particularly the philosophy of music
.
He earned master's degrees in both philosophy (University of Michigan
, 1958) and musicology (Yale University
, 1960). He earned his PhD at Columbia University
in 1966. He joined the faculty at Rutgers the following year, and became full professor in 1976. He taught there for his whole career except one year as a visiting professor at University of California, Santa Barbara
.
His early work is on the 18th-century British aesthetics, and was influenced by Francis Hutcheson
. From there he developed an interest in analytic aesthetics. From the late 1970s on, he has been interested mainly in music philosophy. His book The Corded Shell made him a central figure in music aesthetics.
One preoccupation of his has been the problem of what it means for instrumental music to "express" an emotion. His answer is that common emotions have physical behavioral expression in people that can be understood by appearance and imitated in music; thus, music cannot express more complex emotions that do not have an obvious behavioral expression. A similar position is followed by Stephen Davies
.
Rutgers University
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey , is the largest institution for higher education in New Jersey, United States. It was originally chartered as Queen's College in 1766. It is the eighth-oldest college in the United States and one of the nine Colonial colleges founded before the American...
. He studies aesthetics
Aesthetics
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...
and the philosophy of art, particularly the philosophy of music
Philosophy of music
Philosophy of music is the study of fundamental questions regarding music. The philosophical study of music has many connections with philosophical questions in metaphysics and aesthetics.Some basic questions in the philosophy of music are:...
.
He earned master's degrees in both philosophy (University of Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
, 1958) and musicology (Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, 1960). He earned his PhD at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in 1966. He joined the faculty at Rutgers the following year, and became full professor in 1976. He taught there for his whole career except one year as a visiting professor at University of California, Santa Barbara
University of California, Santa Barbara
The University of California, Santa Barbara, commonly known as UCSB or UC Santa Barbara, is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a site in Goleta, California, from Santa Barbara and northwest of Los...
.
His early work is on the 18th-century British aesthetics, and was influenced by Francis Hutcheson
Francis Hutcheson (philosopher)
Francis Hutcheson was a philosopher born in Ireland to a family of Scottish Presbyterians who became one of the founding fathers of the Scottish Enlightenment....
. From there he developed an interest in analytic aesthetics. From the late 1970s on, he has been interested mainly in music philosophy. His book The Corded Shell made him a central figure in music aesthetics.
One preoccupation of his has been the problem of what it means for instrumental music to "express" an emotion. His answer is that common emotions have physical behavioral expression in people that can be understood by appearance and imitated in music; thus, music cannot express more complex emotions that do not have an obvious behavioral expression. A similar position is followed by Stephen Davies
Stephen Davies (philosopher)
Stephen Davies is a professor of philosophy at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He mainly writes on aesthetics, particularly the philosophy of music but also works on political philosophy...
.
Books
- Speaking of Art (1973).
- Francis Hutcheson's Inquiry Concerning Beauty, Order, Harmony, Design (ed., 1973).
- Thomas Reid's Lectures on the Fine Arts (ed., 1973).
- The Seventh Sense: A Study of Francis Hutcheson's Aesthetics, and its Influence in Eighteenth-Century Britain (1976, 2nd ed. 2003).
- The Corded Shell: Reflections on Musical Expression (1980).
- Sound and Semblance: Reflections on Musical Representation (1984, 2nd ed. 1991).
- Osmin's Rage: Philosophical Reflections on Opera, Drama and Text (1988, 2nd ed.).
- Sound Sentiment: An Essay on Musical Emotions (1989).
- Music Alone: Philosophical Reflections on the Purely Musical Experience (1990).
- Essays on the History of Aesthetics (ed., 1992)
- The Fine Art of Repetition: And Other Essays in the Philosophy of Music (collection, 1993)
- Authenticities: Philosophical Reflections on Musical Performance (1995).
- Philosophies of Arts: An Essay in Differences (1997).
- New Essays on Musical Understanding (collection, 2001)
- The Possessor and the Possessed: Handel, Mozart, Beethoven and Idea of Musical Genius (2001).
- Introduction to a Philosophy of Music (2002).
- The Blackwell Guide to Aesthetics (ed., 2004)
- The Performance of Reading: an Essay in the Philosophy of Literature (2006).
- Music, Language, and Cognition: And Other Essays in the Philosophy of Music, further collected essays of Peter Kivy (collection, 2007).
- Antithetical Arts: On the Ancient Quarrel Between Literature and Music (2009).
Reception
Some criticism of Kivy's ideas is available in Music, Philosophy, and Modernity by Andrew Bowie, 2007.Reference
- Naomi Cumming. "Peter Kivy." Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed August 3, 2010) (subscription access).
Further reading
- Douglas Dempster. "How Does Debussy's Sea Crash? How Can Jimi's Rocket Red Glare?: Kivy's Account of Representation in Music." Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 52/4 (Autumn 1994): 415-428.
- Kelly Dean Jolly. "(Kivy on) The Form-Content Identity Thesis." British Journal of Aesthetics 48/2 (April 2008): 193-204.