Bulletin Autumn‧Winter 1980

Ninth International Phenomenology Conference The Nature and Origin o f A r t The Ninth International Phenomenology Conference on ‘The Nature and Origin of A rt’ was held at this University from 6th to 8th November, 1980. The Conference was co-sponsored by the Comparative Literature Division of the Comparative Literature and Translation Centre and the Philosophy Department of the University, in conjunction with theWorld Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning. Over 35 philosophers, critics, and literary comparatists from Europe, America, Japan, Korea, and Hong Kong attended the Conference. Phenomenology, founded by German philo sopher Edmund Husserl in about 1905, is a theory which stresses the distinctions between the realm of consciousness and natural phenomena— the former is intentional and thus cannot be reduced to the latter. The World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning was founded in 1975, with headquarters in Massachusetts, U.S.A. This Ninth Conference was held in four sessions and the areas covered in the presentations ranged from philosophical theories on the nature o f art and explorations of Western and Eastern aesthetics to concrete investigations of works of art and literary expression. Participants of the Conference were committed to an interdisciplinary approach, viewing phenomenology not as a self-enclosed philosophical discipline, but rather asacomparative way of thinking which would strengthen the common experiences of the artist and the critic. By and large, both Westerners and Easterners found themselves very much in agree ment for, in the East, the philosopher-litterateur has often been considered the ideal type while, in theWest, modern philosophers (e.g., Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Sartre) frequently have expressed their philosophy in literary forms. The topic for the first session was, ‘Aesthetics East and West'. Jean-Claude Piguet (University of Lausanne, Switzerland), spoke on 'Principles of Phenomenological Aesthetics' and gave a compre hensive introduction to phenomenology in its contem porary socio-cultural context along with a thought- provoking examination of the relationships between language, thought, and reality. The validity of a phenomenological approach and the plea for a sound phenomenological method were convincingly argued. His paper was followed by Liu Chang-yuan's (The Chinese University, Hong Kong) systematic investigation 22