Stefan Sperl: "Different Aesthetics" – A New Approach to Sufi Texts?

About this episode

Stefan Sperl discusses a new approach to Sufi texts through the lens of aesthetics and its implications for socio-cultural and psychological processes.

"Different Aesthetics" – A New Approach to Sufi Texts? The topic of the MIAS-Warburg Symposium was inspired by an interdisciplinary research project on Premodern Aesthetics spearheaded by the University of Tuebingen. It approaches aesthetic acts and artifacts not as objects sufficient unto themselves and hence to be viewed with 'disinterested pleasure' (Kant), but as agents endowed with an aesthetic energy in which their true purpose resides, and which explains the dynamic impact they can have on socio-cultural and psychological processes. The aesthetic acts and artifacts studied by the project also include Christian mystical texts whose aesthetic energy aims to engender in the recipient a state of consciousness akin to the beatific vision. A collection of papers produced by contributors to the Tuebingen project has just appeared in English translation (Different Aesthetics: Principles, Questions, Perspectives, edited by A. Gerock-Reiter et al., De Gruyter, 2025). The presentation will introduce the scope of the project, discuss recent examples of its application to Christian and Muslim texts, and conclude with remarks on its relevance for the study of the Akbarian tradition…

People in this episode

Guest: Stefan Sperl

Topics covered

• Sufi texts
• aesthetics
• interdisciplinary research
• Christian mystical texts
• Akbarian tradition

Keywords

• Sufi texts
• aesthetics
• Christian mystical texts
• Akbarian tradition
• interdisciplinary research

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University of Tuebingen, SOAS, UNHCR

Books & works: Different Aesthetics: Principles, Questions, Perspectives

Places: Egypt, Sudan, Geneva

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