Call for Papers - Contemporary Aesthetics | Special Volume - How will AI Change the Field of Academic Aesthetics?

Call for Papers

Contemporary Aesthetics Special Volume
How will AI Change the Field of Academic Aesthetics?

Guest editors Gioia Laura Iannilli (Bologna University) and Ossi Naukkarinen (Aalto University), with co-editor Enrico Glerean (Aalto University)

Over the past few years, Artificial Intelligence, AI, has increasingly entered our everyday lives and different versions of it are changing our political, medical, economic, creative, recreational and many other practices. It is practically impossible not to use and be affected by AI because our cars, smartphones, factories, and electrical networks, for example, are dependent on it.

The broad field of aesthetics, spanning the whole varied spectrum of art–non-art, has also been affected by this process, and scholars of aesthetics have increasingly turned their attention to the implications of AI. A few examples include Manovich & Arielli’s Artificial Aesthetics: A Critical Guide to AI, Media and Design (2021-2023); Eduardo Navas’ The Rise of Metacreativity – An Aesthetics after Remix (2023); Special Issue of AI and Society , n. 26, vol. 4 (2021); Samo & Highhouse’s article Artificial intelligence and art: Identifying the aesthetic judgment factors that distinguish human- and machine-generated artwork (2023); and the recent debate on the website “Aesthetics for birds” (2023), available at: aestheticsforbirds.com/2023/11/02/eight-scholars-on-art-and-artificial-intelligence/.On 7 November 2023, Google search engine gave 2 670 000 000 results on the search “AI and art” and 342 000 000on “AI and aesthetics”. (Check the numbers of the date when we publish the cfp) Often, though, the current debate is devoted to assessing the nature and value of art generated by AI.  

This special issue of Contemporary Aesthetics has a different and more tightly focused aim. We would like to investigate how the phenomena and implications of AI affect a specific area of aesthetics, namely the academic discipline. The core questions orienting this call for papers address the future of aesthetics. How will researching, writing, studying, learning, and teaching aesthetics happen in the age of AI? How to use AI responsibly, or sensibly, in an academic field that is challenged by new elements entering it after it has evolved in very different ways over the past centuries? What kinds of AI technologies are used now and in the future and how will they transform our field? What will remain unchanged and why?

Areas of interest can be, but are not limited to, the following:

• AI's Role Beyond Its Traditional Domains

What areas of AI, traditionally applied to other fields of research, can have a role in the development of academic aesthetics? 

• Human-AI Collaboration in Aesthetics

What kind of contribution the human agent can or must provide in this framework?

• Enhancing Aesthetic Literature with AI

How can traditional and contemporary aesthetic literature benefit from AI fueled research? 

• Revisiting Aesthetic History through AI

Is it possible to re-write the history of aesthetics through AI?

• Educational Transformation via AI

What are the educational implications of AI in the field of aesthetics?

• Potential Risks of AI in Aesthetics:

What kinds of risks does AI bring?

Deadline for submissions is June, 30 2024.

Please send the submissions and inquiries to: gioialaura.iannilli2@unibo.it

The maximum length is 7,000 words including endnotes and abstract. Please follow carefully the submission guidelines of Contemporary Aesthetics: https://contempaesthetics.org/submissions/. The writing convention, style, and citation format used in Contemporary Aesthetics may be very different from what is considered proper in different linguistic practices and academic writing conventions. So, when in doubt, consult published articles in Contemporary Aesthetics for examples.