Practicing aesthetics
Futoshi Hoshino, Practicing Aesthetics, Tokyo: Suiseisha, 2021.
What is aesthetics? This book attempts to answer this somewhat grandiose question in a non-fundamental way. By “in a non-fundamental way,” I do not mean to ask for a “definition” of what aesthetics is or a “history” of what aesthetics has been, but rather to show what kind of “practice” aesthetics is, in a way that gathers several texts I have published. (p. 9)
Rhetoric of the Sublime
Futoshi Hoshino, Rhetoric of the Sublime, Tokyo: Getsuyosha, 2017.
The main subject of this book is On the Sublime, the oldest work on the sublime by Longinus, and its reception from the 17th to 20th century. Through this, I tried to find another genealogy of the “sublime,” which is now exclusively regarded as an aesthetic concept: that is, what I call the “rhetorical sublime.” (p. 12)
The Sublime and the Uncanny
Futoshi Hoshino and Kamelia Spassova (eds.), The Sublime and the Uncanny, Tokyo: UTCP, 2016.
This volume includes papers presented at the international forum “The Sublime and the Uncanny” on March 3 and 4, 2015 at Sofia University, Bulgaria. The forum was co-organized by the Sofia Literary Theory Seminar (SLS), Cultural Center of Sofia University, and University of Tokyo Center for Philosophy (UTCP). It focused on notions of the “sublime” and the “uncanny,” which play a crucial role not only in the 20th century but also in contemporary critical discourses. The forum posed the question of heuristic potential of these notions in the time of redefinition of understanding of the human intellect and status of the (in) human, respectively. (p. 7)
Futoshi Hoshino 