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Aesthetics of universal knowledge
Schaffer S., Tresch J., Gagliardi P., Palgrave Macmillan, New York, NY, 2017. 271 pp. Type: Book (978-3-319425-94-8)
Date Reviewed: Nov 30 2017

As its name reveals, this book purports to describe what these authors choose to refer to as “aesthetics” and what they call “universal knowledge.” A tiny group of European sophisticates claim the right to show all of us natives (90 percent of the world) what universal knowledge looks like; it is telling, quite telling, that the references throughout the book are almost exclusively European. The book is documentation of some discussions, seemingly “informal” (that is, without previously prepared papers) of certain subjects based upon concepts of cartography, that took place in Venice, Italy.

The aesthetics are those of the authors, and I found almost nothing “universal” in this little book; certainly no universal lessons in aesthetics, broadly (or narrowly) applicable through multiple cultures and venues in the world.

The book begins with a longish, and boring, introduction, followed by Part 1 entitled “Visions” and having four chapters, Part 2 entitled “Worlds” with three chapters, and finally Part 3 entitled “Economies” and having three chapters. The general structure of each chapter is a presentation by a central author of that chapter’s theme, followed by some discussion by the other participants.

In Part 2, “World,” the various authors actually “managed” to find two references, out of 30, that were not European. This is their view of the “world.”

Chapter 10, which opens Part 3, “Economies,” discusses Google and the evolution of its search engine, calling this a “cosmogram” but using (seemingly) a nonstandard definition. Kind of “cute,” as the definition given by a Google search (“A cosmogram is a flat geometric figure depicting a cosmology. Some of them were created for meditational purpose. Mandalas are the best known cosmograms, but similar diagrams, known as schema, were also used in western Europe during the Middle Ages”) differs markedly from what the author refers to. Clearly, Google’s search engine is not a “flat geometric figure.” This kind of fatuous misuse of language for the author’s purposes is one of the aspects making certain this book is anything but “universal.” The author’s historical account of Google’s evolution is “kind of nice” but leaves the reader with: “yes, so … what is the point?” The discussion following is just as confused.

Even in terms of the publisher, the book is disappointing. Nothing in the book integrates it into a whole. There is no index, no collected bibliography (only at the end of each chapter). None of the illustrations are in color. Out of 57 figures, three are non-European. (There is a list of figures.) It is very poorly referenced; again, while the quantity of references “looks” large, their obvious effort to retain a strictly Eurocentric view of absolutely everything makes the lengths of the various lists little more than self-serving, in view of the current difficulties in continental Europe.

Cry for the trees; luckily the book is short and small. I most certainly do not recommend it. I find no real audience for what it contains, nor relevance to any group outside of the group that had these particular discussions. The authors discussed among themselves, and it would have been much better had the discussions remained with them. Overall, it is relatively poorly written. All in all, I do not think it would be a useful addition to either a professional or a private library.

Reviewer:  Mordechai Ben-Menachem Review #: CR145685 (1802-0064)
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Arts And Humanities (J.5 )
 
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