Denis Dutton Explained

Denis Dutton
Birth Name:Denis Laurence Dutton
Birth Date:9 February 1944
Birth Place:Los Angeles, California, United States
Death Place:Christchurch, New Zealand
Occupation:Academic, internet entrepreneur, and media commentator
Language:English
Nationality:American and New Zealander
Genres:-->
Subjects:Art, evolution, and media
Notableworks:Arts & Letters Daily
Children:2

Denis Laurence Dutton (9 February 1944 – 28 December 2010)[1] was an American philosopher of art, web entrepreneur, and media activist. He was a professor of philosophy at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. He was also a co-founder and co-editor of the websites Arts & Letters Daily, ClimateDebateDaily.com, and cybereditions.com.[2]

Life and career

Denis Dutton was born in Los Angeles, California, United States, on 9 February 1944, as the second of four children of William and Thelma Dutton,[3] who were booksellers and founded what became Dutton's Books, a chain of independent bookstores. He grew up in North Hollywood, graduated from North Hollywood High School, and was educated at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he earned his bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1966 and his PhD in philosophy in 1975. Between taking these degrees, he went to India with the Peace Corps and learned to play sitar. Dutton taught at several American universities, including the University of California, Santa Barbara and the University of Michigan–Dearborn, before emigrating to New Zealand.

Dutton started teaching at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, in 1984. From 2008 to 2010, he was the Head of the Philosophy school in an unofficial capacity and acted briefly as Head of Humanities. At its December 2010 graduation ceremony, the University of Canterbury awarded Dutton a research medal for his work.[4]

He was a member of the editorial board for The Rutherford Journal.[5]

On 28 December 2010, Dutton died from cancer.[6] [7]

Arts & Letters Daily

Dutton was best known for the web aggregation site Arts & Letters Daily, which he founded in 1998 and which secured him a place among "the most influential media personalities in the world".[8] The site, described as "the first and foremost aggregator of well-written and well-argued book reviews, essays, and other articles in the realm of ideas",[9] features links to articles across the web about literature, art, science, and politics, for which Dutton wrote pithy teasers. In recognition of Arts & Letters Daily, Steven Pinker called Dutton a visionary for recognizing that a website "could be a forum for cutting-edge ideas, not just a way to sell things or entertain the bored".

Cybereditions

Dutton served as executive director of Cybereditions, a print on demand publishing company he founded in 2000[10] which specializes in new and out-of-print copyright works, mostly of a scholarly nature. The editorial board of the company has included other academics such as Frederick Crews, Anthony Grafton and Marjorie Perloff.[11]

Aesthetics

Dutton wrote on authenticity in art and distinguished between nominal authenticity, in which a work of art is correctly attributed to its author rather than being a forgery, and expressive authenticity, where a work is a true expression of an individual's or a society's values and beliefs.[12]

In his book The Art Instinct (2010)[13] Dutton opposes the view that art appreciation is culturally learned, claiming instead that art appreciation stems from evolutionary adaptions made during the Pleistocene.[14] He set out abbreviated versions of his theory in a 2009 Google Talk lecture[15] and a 2010 TED talk.[16]

Dutton also argued that progress in the arts and sciences had declined, especially since around 1800.[17]

Criticism of academic prose

As editor of the journal Philosophy and Literature, Dutton ran the Bad Writing Contest, which aimed to "expose 'pretentious, swaggering gibberish' passed off as scholarship at leading universities". In 1995, the contest was won by Homi K. Bhabha and Fredric Jameson.[18] In 1998, the contest awarded first place to philosopher and University of California-Berkeley Professor Judith Butler, for a sentence which appeared in the journal diacritics.[19] Butler defended their work against the charges of academic pedantry and obscurantism in the pages of The New York Times.[20] Dutton then ended the contest.

The Bad Writing Contest emerged in an intellectual climate dominated by fallout from the Sokal affair,[21] [22] in which the alleged opaqueness and obscurity of postmodern writing came in for criticism: Edward Said, for instance, deplored "diminishment and incoherence" in the writings of some of his colleagues and Martha Nussbaum condemned academic writing that was "ponderous and obscure".[23]

Politics and activism

Dutton supported "conservative ideas"[24] and was a member of the Libertarian Party for some years.

Dutton was one of the founding members and first chair of the NZ Skeptics. In 2009, he stated that he believed that "climate change is still an open question".[25]

He was also a passionate supporter of public radio. In the early 1990s he founded the lobby group The New Zealand Friends of Public Broadcasting in response to proposals to devolve New Zealand's two non-commercial public radio stations.[26]

In 1995 he was appointed to the board of directors of Radio New Zealand, where he served for seven years.[27] After concluding his term as a director, Dr Dutton and Dr John Isles issued a report criticising Radio New Zealand for loss of neutrality in news and current affairs, failure to adhere to charter and opposed to contestable funding of broadcasting.[28]

Bibliography

Dutton's publications include:

External links

Notes and References

  1. News: Denis Dutton, Philosopher, Dies at 66. Margalit. Fox. The New York Times. 31 December 2010.
  2. Web site: The gleeful contrarian . 3 November 2000 . 25 March 2008 . Ray Sawhill . Salon.com . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20080307112136/http://archive.salon.com/tech/view/2000/11/03/dutton/index.html . 7 March 2008 .
  3. News: Woo. Elaine. Denis Dutton dies at 66: Founder of Arts & Letters Daily website. Los Angeles Times. 2012-02-27. 2 January 2011.
  4. Web site: Renowned academic receives top honour . Matthews, Philip . 16 December 2010 . . 27 September 2011.
  5. Web site: Editorial board . . 19 December 2016 .
  6. Web site: Professor, web entrepreneur Denis Dutton dies . 28 December 2010 . . 27 September 2011.
  7. News: Arts author Denis Dutton dies aged 66 . BBC News . 29 December 2010.
  8. Grossman. Lev. Meet Joe Blog. Time. 13 June 2004. https://archive.today/20130204103015/http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,650732,00.html. dead. 4 February 2013.
  9. 28 December 2010. Denis Dutton. Blake. Eskin. https://archive.today/20130208164024/http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/postscript/2.html%23entry-2000000001114450. dead. 8 February 2013. The New Yorker.
  10. News: Boynton. Robert S.. Hoping Web Success Strikes Twice. The New York Times. New York. 11 November 2000.
  11. News: Reading between the dots. The Sydney Morning Herald. 3 March 2001 . Andrew . Riemer. 8.
  12. Authenticity in Art . The Oxford Handbook of Aesthetics . Jerrold Levinson . Oxford University Press . 2003 . Denis Dutton . 31 March 2011 . 7 January 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110107125522/http://denisdutton.com/authenticity.htm . dead .
  13. Book: Dutton, Denis. Oxford University Press. 978-1-60819-055-3. The Art Instinct: Beauty, Pleasure, and Human Evolution. Oxford. 2010.
  14. News: The Descent of Taste . The New York Times . Anthony . Gottlieb . 1 February 2009 . 2010-05-01.
  15. Denis Dutton . 2009 . Authors@Google: Denis Dutton . YouTube . Mountain View, CA . 27 February 2012.
  16. Video on TED.com . Dutton, Denis (Contributor) . Denis Dutton: A Darwinian theory of beauty . TED . 2012-03-12 . February 2010 . 11 February 2014 . https://web.archive.org/web/20140211012601/http://www.ted.com/talks/denis_dutton_a_darwinian_theory_of_beauty.html . dead .
  17. Web site: Of Human Accomplishment. Denis. Dutton. Denisdutton.com. 5 May 2011. 16 July 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20110716183706/http://denisdutton.com/murray_review.htm. dead.
  18. Web site: Dutton . Denis . The Bad Writing Contest: Press Releases, 1996–1998 . DenisDutton.com . 2010-10-30 . 1998 . 4 March 2016 . https://web.archive.org/web/20160304022732/http://denisdutton.com/bad_writing.htm . dead .
  19. News: Dutton . Denis . Language Crimes: A Lesson in How Not to Write, Courtesy of the Professoriate . The Wall Street Journal . 2010-10-30 . 5 February 1999 . 25 January 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110125094335/http://www.denisdutton.com/language_crimes.htm . dead .
  20. News: Butler . Judith . A 'Bad Writer' Bites Back . The New York Times . 2010-10-30 . 20 March 1999 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20111008194554/https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/wash/www/butler.htm . 8 October 2011 .
  21. News: The Washington Times. 13 March 1999. Pomobabble rooted in ivy. John. Leo. C1.
  22. News: The Irish Times. 8 April 1999. Bad blood over bad writing: Critics say US academic language has become so convoluted that it is largely incomprehensible to the point where argument is becoming impossible. Richard. Kelly. 15.
  23. News: The New York Times. 27 February 1999. When Ideas Get Lost in Bad Writing: Attacks on scholars include a barbed contest with 'prizes'. Dinitia. Smith. B9.
  24. News: Vale Denis Dutton: A professor of philosophy who civilized the Internet. Hal G.P.. Colebatch. 30 December 2010. American Spectator. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20111118092733/http://spectator.org/archives/2010/12/30/vale-denis-dutton. 18 November 2011.
  25. News: And in this corner.... The Press. 2 January 2008.
  26. Web site: NZine: Public broadcasting – Not everyone is apathetic. 18 July 1998. 2008-03-27. 25 November 2005. https://web.archive.org/web/20051125073819/http://www.nzine.co.nz/features/broadcasting.html. dead.
  27. Web site: Board appointments for NZOA and RNZ. 4 February 2002. Marion Hobbs, MP. New Zealand Government. 2008-03-26.
  28. Web site: Parliamentary debate: 3rd reading of Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill . Coddington, Deborah M.P. . 30 March 2004 . 2008-03-27 . Hansard .

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