Skip to main content Skip to navigation

IP120-15 Beauty

Department
Liberal Arts
Level
Undergraduate Level 1
Module leader
Kim Lockwood Clough
Credit value
15
Module duration
10 weeks
Assessment
100% coursework
Study location
University of Warwick main campus, Coventry

Introductory description

What is beauty? What does it mean to be beautiful? How do we know beauty when we see it?

The Irish poet and philosopher John O'Donohue defines beauty as "the edge of becoming...an emerging fullness, a greater sense of grace and elegance, a deeper sense of depth, and also a kind of homecoming for the enriched memory of your unfolding life."

Yet, when many of us think of beauty, we might find such a definition to be dissonant, considering beauty as something that is entirely socially constructed by the patriarchy, observable in mass media, celebrity culture, concepts of glamour, consumerism, and increasingly unrealistic expectations.

Such radically different approaches to the critical issue of beauty are not unique to our historical moment or our culture. Beauty has been a key issue for critical thinkers across cultures for centuries and can be approached from a wide variety of perspectives.

Definitions of beauty can range from the transcendent possibilities of awakening one's love of the true and the good as seen in Plato and Plotinus; aesthetic discussions of what makes poetry beautiful in Aristotle and Tasso; visual debates on beauty in Renaissance portraiture; Natural landscapes and the experience of sublimity as described in Kantian thought; Musical expressions of beauty by romantic composers such as Beethoven, Chopin, and Wagner; early twentieth-century futurist conceptions of the beauty of machines; the beauty of great social movements in Soviet art; postmodern deconstructions of beauty via the use of pastiche, sampling, and collage in the works of artists such as Andy Warhol and Grandmaster Flash; and redefinitions, reclamations, and resistance to ideals of beauty by Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Rhianna, and Lady Gaga. Beauty can equally be seen as a dangerous concept that was (and is still) used to justify the horrors of colonialism, to establish oppressive normative frameworks of gender, to reinforce existing social inequality, and as a framework that enables ongoing exploitative industries such as social media, fast fashion, or pornography.

This module will not tell you what beauty is nor how to think about it. Instead, it will challenge your existing preconceptions and encourage you to develop critical thinking skills around the interdisciplinary issue of beauty through encounters with theoretical frameworks, detailed case studies, and focussed problems. The module will combine a wide variety of perspectives drawn from disciplines such as aesthetics, musicology, sociology, art history, gender studies, media and communications studies, literary studies, anthropology, poetics, and other relevant areas of study.

Module web page

Module aims

Through weekly groupwork and problem-based learning sessions, we will work together to explore complex questions such as:

  • Is beauty an objective universal concept or is it dependent on individual subjectivities and forms of socialisation? In other words, is beauty in the "eye of the beholder," or is it an objective characteristic?

  • How is beauty expressed, encountered, or experienced in different cultures, mediums, and time periods?

  • Can the experience of beauty be mentally, psychologically, and/or spiritually transformative?

  • What does it mean to challenge, destabilise, resist, deconstruct, or decolonise beauty?

  • Are there traditions of beauty that are worth keeping, reinventing, and passing on?

  • What are the social and psychological consequences of ideals of beauty?

  • Can animals be beautiful or is beauty exclusively a human construct?

  • What makes a human-created space—whether a city, a neighbourhood, a building, or a particular way of decorating one's home/ arranging objects—"beautiful"? How have micro and macro geographies of beauty shifted over time?

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

The syllabus for this module is flexible as it will depend on the expertise of the module convenor and student interests. The module will always be interdisciplinary in nature, but will feature a wide variety of case studies which may change from year to year. An indicative syllabus may include case studies such as:

—Writing the Perfect Poem: Aristotle and Tasso on Poetic Beauty

—Beyond Orientalism: Decolonising Beauty in post-1960s Egyptian Cinema

—Musical Beauty and the Romantic Sublime

—Spreadable Spectacle: Beauty, Social Media, and Mental Health

—Manufacturing Desire: The Development of the Beauty Industry from Perfume to Fast Fashion

—Capturing Laura: Petrarchism and Beauty Ideals in Renaissance Portraiture

—Beauty as a Road to God: from Dante to O'Donohue

—The Problem of Pornography: Oppression, Exploitation, or Liberation?

—Natural Beauty? Crafting and Representing Landscapes

—Build Back Beautiful: Urban Debates on Rebuilding after the Great Fire of London and the Great Chicago Fire

—Kitsch and the "Cult of Ugliness:" Postmodern Approaches to Beauty

—The Beauty of "Progress:" Representing Social Movements

—Remixing Beauty from Britney to Beyoncé

—Absence as Beauty: Iconoclasm and Revolution

—Beauty and the Beast: The Acculturation of Beauty Standards Among Children

—Maybe She's Born With It?: Biological Approaches to Beauty

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

  • demonstrate an in-depth understanding of beauty as a critical issue
  • critically analyse ideas of beauty across cultures, disciplines, and time periods
  • analyse case studies related to beauty from interdisciplinary perspectives
  • mobilise relevant academic scholarship in support of their ideas

Indicative reading list

View reading list on Talis Aspire

Research element

Students will be asked to conduct independent research for the assessments on this module.

Interdisciplinary

All modules in Liberal Arts are interdisciplinary/transdisciplinary by definition. This module is no exception. It features theories and ideas from a wide range of disciplines.

International

The module will employ case studies from around the world. As students will have input into which case studies they would like to explore, the module will embody the best principles of representative curriculum design.

Subject specific skills

As a first-year core module, students who take this module will gain skills such as critical thinking, writing skills such as argument structure, learn to navigate interdisciplinary approaches, hone their reading skills (with regard to complex theory), gain independent research skills, etc...

These skills will be foundational for their future studies in Liberal Arts.

Transferable skills

All skills gained in a Liberal Arts module are transferrable by definition.

Like all Liberal Arts modules, students on this module will learn time managment, project management (by working in weekly groups), critical thinking, and gain greater confidence in their own ability to express and structure evidence-based arguments.

In terms of personal development, this module will encourage students to think critically about their own preconceptions and to consider beauty from a complex and multifaceted perspective.

Study time

Type Required
Lectures (0%)
Seminars 10 sessions of 2 hours (13%)
Private study 40 hours (26%)
Assessment 95 hours (61%)
Total 155 hours

Private study description

Approximately three and a half hours per week (on average) will be dedicated to readings, tasks between seminars, groupwork, and preparation.

Costs

No further costs have been identified for this module.

You do not need to pass all assessment components to pass the module.

Assessment group A2
Weighting Study time Eligible for self-certification
Assessment component
Beauty Portfolio 50% 45 hours Yes (extension)

Portfolio of tasks related to content on the module.

Reassessment component is the same
Assessment component
Beauty Essay 50% 50 hours Yes (extension)

Essay exploring a topic related to beauty.

Reassessment component is the same
Feedback on assessment

Feedback will be provided on Tabula.

Courses

This module is Core optional for:

  • UVCA-LA99 Undergraduate Liberal Arts
    • Year 1 of LA99 Liberal Arts
    • Year 1 of LA92 Liberal Arts with Classics
    • Year 1 of LA73 Liberal Arts with Design Studies
    • Year 1 of LA83 Liberal Arts with Economics
    • Year 1 of LA82 Liberal Arts with Education
    • Year 1 of LA95 Liberal Arts with English
    • Year 1 of LA81 Liberal Arts with Film and Television Studies
    • Year 1 of LA80 Liberal Arts with Global Sustainable Development
    • Year 1 of LA93 Liberal Arts with Global Sustainable Development
    • Year 1 of LA97 Liberal Arts with History
    • Year 1 of LA71 Liberal Arts with Law
    • Year 1 of LA91 Liberal Arts with Life Sciences
    • Year 1 of LA75 Liberal Arts with Modern Lanaguages and Cultures
    • Year 1 of LA96 Liberal Arts with Philosophy
    • Year 1 of LA94 Liberal Arts with Theatre and Performance Studies
  • UVCA-LA98 Undergraduate Liberal Arts with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA85 Liberal Arts with Classics with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA72 Liberal Arts with Design Studies with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA79 Liberal Arts with Economics with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA78 Liberal Arts with Education with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA88 Liberal Arts with English with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA77 Liberal Arts with Film and Television Studies with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA76 Liberal Arts with Global Sustainable Development with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA86 Liberal Arts with Global Sustainable Development with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA90 Liberal Arts with History with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA98 Liberal Arts with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA84 Liberal Arts with Life Sciences with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA74 Liberal Arts with Modern Lanaguages and Cultures with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA89 Liberal Arts with Philosophy with Intercalated Year
    • Year 1 of LA87 Liberal Arts with Theatre and Performance Studies with Intercalated Year