Recent research projects in the Department
Recent research projects in the Department of Philosophy include:
Irony and Point of View in Representational Art
Project: British Academy/Leverhulme Senior Research Fellowship 2007-8
Project leader: Greg Currie
The point of view of a work of art is partly constituted by its restriction of visual access to the represented scene, as in the case of pictures, or by the use of a narrator whose knowledge of events is in some way limited. But points of view are also a means by which the author encourage certain evaluative and emotional responses to the events and characters of the depicted world. One aim of this study is to develop a theory about the relations between points of view as restrictions of access to information, and their capacity to guide the responses of an audience. But sometimes what appears to be the point of view of the work is actually presented ironically: there are indications, intrinsic to the work itself, that this point of view is defective in certain ways.
Drawing on general considerations about the nature of communication, I develop an account of how the defects of points of view are indicated, and examine the effects of such irony on the work's capacity to generate emotional and evaluative responses of an audience. Throughout, examples from the depictive, and especially photographic arts are used, along with examples from literature and film.
Daniel Nolan: Philip Leverhulme Prize
Daniel Nolan was awarded sufficient funding for two years of research leave by the Leverhulme Trust after winning one of their Philip Leverhulme Prizes. He used the funding to work on fictionalism and on the methodology of inquiry.
Harold Noonan: Mind Research Fellowship
Harold Noonan recently secured a Mind Association Research Fellowship, which he used to work on Kripke's Naming and Necessity.