Description
Book SynopsisExplores the intersection of beauty and violence by examining university lectures and course materials on aesthetics along with riots, acts of domestic terrorism, and magic lantern exhibitions. This work suggests that the distance separating academic thinking and popular wisdom about social transformation is narrower than we generally suppose.
Trade Review"Beautiful Democracy is an important book, reestablishing aesthetics as a vital issue both within the immediate field of American literature and far beyond it. It engages a long and complexly developed conversation on the politics of form, using rich archival material, ranging from college curricula, black print culture, and the history of film." - Wai Chee Dimock, Yale University"
