Cultural Formalism: The Enquiry of Cultural Aesthetics

The study of ‘forms’ is readily associated with the tradition of Formalism in art criticism whereby plastic modes of aesthetic expressions are central to its investigations. My interest in probing cultural forms stems from the question “how might the aesthetic focus of Formalism be applied to cultural analysis?” That is, if forms of arts receive heightened attention for their expressive configuration and manifestation, what about positing enquiries directed at forms of living and ways of life which are nothing short of aesthetic expressions? By asking this question I’m also offering a hypothesis about the concrete existence of ‘cultural form,’ and how it comes with the demand for clarifying certain attentions. Such accentuations orientate us towards discerning and describing forms of cultural experience. Hence a theory of cultural form emerges in marking out modes of attention that indicate certain interests and priorities. Indeed, I suggest that the body of work cohering around (impersonal) senses, affect, “structures of feeling,” and social aesthetics has always already, to varying degrees, pertained to enquiries of cultural form. This essay draws on an array of theoretical work that invoke the aesthetic forms of culture and a mode of enquiry pertaining to cultural aesthetics.