R. G. Collingwood:

Collingwood, R. G. (1938) Principles of Art (London: Oxford U Press), pp. 9, 11.

Robin George Collingwood (February 22, 1889 – January 9, 1943)

Collingwood is an Expressive Theorist with respect to the nature of art so there is an affinity between him and Tolstoy.

• Tolstoy is gravely mistaken
• Tolstoy gets the phenomenology of artistic expression wrong.
• First we “feel” then we try to discern what we feel.

Note: This seems to be better supported by cognitive science. The idea being that we have an affective (non-cognitive) response and it is only through the process of successive cognitive appraisals and reappraisals that we come to know what the response was a response to and what it was that we are/were feeling.

Hence, it’s not…

“A tiger? …Agh!”

rather it’s…

“Agh! …A tiger!”

Collingwood differs with Tolstoy in that:

1. Denies that it is the aim of the artist to arouse emotions in the audience.

1. This would require a pre-knowledge of what the emotion is which the artist does not have until after the production of the work.
2. It is through the work that the artist himself comes to know what he is feeling.

2. What the act of expression is.

1. It is NOT communication among or between people.
2. Expression is the converting of our unarticulated feeling into an articulation.

i. Problem: This raises the question of whether we are creating the emotion or articulating it. (Think of it this way, the clay is an amorphous blob until it is extruded and it is the extruding that gives it its shape. Does the act of “expressing” give the emotion its shape?)

3. Distinguishes between “Labeling an Emotion” and “Expressing and Emotion.”
1. Labeling An Emotion: merely locating it within a general class. As such it would not call for unique expressions. (One expression of Love is as good as serviceable as any other.)
2. Expressing and Emotion: articulating the very precise and particular emotional token.

Contra Tolstoy and the “Arousal Theory of Expression” he claims, should the artist indeed attempt to produce a (general) emotion in his audience, this is the very opposite of art as it requires and relies on a foreknowledge of an emotion of a general kind and thus overlooks the true individual nature of expression.

“Thus if the activity of art is the expressing of emotions, the reader is an artist as well as the writer. There is no distinction of kind between the artist and the audience.” (My emphasis)

Questions which must be addressed arising from the Expressive Theory

1. What are emotions?

a. Precise articulation as to what “expression of emotions” really is (requires clearer understanding of emotions specifically cognitive or non-cognitive?).

2. What is the Mechanism of Emotional arousal, transmission, and understanding in Art?
1. What affective responses along with what cognitive processes go into the recognition of, sympathetic response to and empathetic response to emotions. (Bottom up? Top Down? Combo? )

3. Why do we enjoy sad music and scary movies when we don’t enjoy being sad or being frightened?
1. “Paradox of Negative Emotions” Why would/do we seek out negative emotional experiences in fiction but not in real life?
2. Are fictional emotions the same thing as, similar to, of barely related to “real emotions?” Do we psycho-physically process the emotions in the same way?

4. Why do we feel emotional responses for fictional characters?
1. “Paradox of Fiction”

Robinson on Collingwood

The expression of emotion is not merely a skill.

Different than betrayal (does not individuate)

To express requires:

a. one is first conscious (excitement)

b. then does something (express)

c. this brings it to self-consciousness (difference in the phenomenological quality, according to Collingwood, one finds the “helplessness lightened”)

-not naming (labeling- locating within a general category)

-not describing (“I am feeling anger.”)

-not arousal of emotion (contra Tolstoy because you can’t know in advance)

Uses :expression” as a technical term:

To say “I love you Freddy.” is not an expression (in his technical sense).

It is only because we express the emotion in words that we know how we feel.

Robinson suggests the Collingwood is right both phenomenologically and from the perspective of Cognitive Science.

• Emotion Response is a Process – initially our attention is drawn to things that are of vital importance to us (a general affective response/evaluation) which gives rise to further appraisals and reappraisals.

• It is not the experience of an “emotional type.”

Shelly’s To a Skylark characterizes the world as it appears (is) to the speaker thus expressing, but also directly articulating the ideas of the poet.

• Initial affective appraisal gives way to subsequent cognitive appraisals and reappraisals.

- physiological responses inform others (and self) what the (general) nature of the appraisal is.

• Labeling comes after the process is over (here we catalogue according to cultural classifications – Folk-psychological terms)

Might also express through art- but this would be a very different process.

Rather than reduce the experience to that of a general kind, we detail the experience in all its uniqueness.

Here we are detailing and articulating an emotional process. (Longing versus a specific longing as experienced by a particular person at a particular time for a particular thing, etc.)

(At least) 3 ways of Expressing

1. show how the world appears to X

2. what the thoughts of X are

3. the action tendencies of X

Problems: Two fold ambiguity in this theory;

1. Is the act of expression one of articulating the pre-existing emotion or constructing and emotion (forming something that did not previously exist)?

2. Is the expression the product of the expressive act or the process of the expressive act?

This Collingwood’s Theory could in fact be one of 4:

	Expression is accomplished in the Process/activity.	Expression is accomplished in the Product.
The Artist Discovers what he was feeling though the expressive act.	1.	2.
The Artist Constitutes what he was feels though the expressive act.	3.	4.

3. If there is no independent criterion of success, how could one (even the artist himself) know when the act of expression has been successful?

(Collingwood claim it is when the vague feeling of oppression is or is not alleviated.)

Paradox of Fiction: An Inconsistent Triad:

I am not emotionally moved by stories I know to be false.

When I engage fiction as fiction, I know the stories to be false.

When I engage fiction as fiction, I am, sometimes, emotionally moved.