Murray Smith (philosopher and film theorist) explained

Murray Smith is a film theorist and philosopher of art based at the University of Kent, where he is Professor of Philosophy, Art, and Film^[1] and co-director of the Aesthetics Research Centre.^[2] He is the author of three books and numerous articles on film and aesthetics, and the co-editor of three collections of essays.^[3] He was President of the Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image from 2014 to 2017,^[4] and has served on the editorial boards of Screen,^[5] Cinema Journal, the British Journal of Aesthetics,^[6] Projections^[7] and Series.^[8] He has held a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (2005–6), and a Laurance S Rockefeller Fellowship at Princeton University’s Centre for Human Values (2017–18).^[9] He delivered a Kracauer Lecture in 2014 at the Goethe University Frankfurt,^[10] the inaugural Beacon Institute lecture in 2015,^[11] and the Beardsley Lecture in 2018, sponsored by Temple University at the Barnes Foundation.^[12]

Work

Murray Smith works in cognitive film theory and analytic philosophy of film. In Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion, and the Cinema (1995/revised edition 2022) Smith rehabilitated the idea that characters are central to our experience of narrative.^[13] His approach to our emotional responses to characters draws on cognitive science and philosophy of mind.^[14] Film Theory and Philosophy (1997), which Smith edited with Richard Allen, makes the wider case for an approach to film drawing on the tools of analytic philosophy.^[15] In Film, Art, and the Third Culture (2017), Smith elaborates and defends the approach underpinning much of his earlier research, arguing in favour of a naturalized or ‘third cultural’ approach to aesthetics, integrating the knowledge and methods of the humanities and the sciences.^{[16] [17]}

Biography

Smith attended Dame Alice Owen's School in Potters Bar,^[18] and studied English Language and Literature at the University of Liverpool.^[19] He began his career as a film theorist as a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he completed his PhD under the supervision of David Bordwell. He is the younger brother of the literary historian Professor Nigel Smith, and spouse of sociologist Professor Miri Song (University of Kent).^[20] Smith plays bass in the Free Range Orchestra, avatars of the New Canterbury Scene.

Books

• Murray Smith, Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion, and the Cinema (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995).^[21]
• Murray Smith and Richard Allen (eds), Film Theory and Philosophy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997).^[22]
• Murray Smith and Steve Neale (eds), Contemporary Hollywood Cinema (London: Routledge, 1998).^[23]
• Murray Smith, Trainspotting (London: BFI Modern Classics, 2002).^[24]
• Murray Smith and Thomas E. Wartenberg (eds), Thinking Through Cinema: Film as Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 2006).^[25]
• Murray Smith, Film, Art, and the Third Culture: A Naturalized Aesthetics of Film (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).^[26]

Selected articles

• 'Feeling Prufish,' Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 2010, 34 (1): 261–279.
• 'Film Theory Meets Analytic Philosophy; Or, Film Studies And L’Affaire Sokal,' Cinema, 2010, 1 (1): 111–117.
• 'Film Art, Argument, and Ambiguity,' Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2006, 64 (1): 33–42.
• 'The Bad and the Beautiful'. Film-Philosophy. 2002, 6 (1).
• 'Rhetoric and Representation in Non-Fiction Film,' British Journal of Aesthetics, 2001, 41 (2): 222–225.
• 'Film Spectatorship and the Institution of Fiction,' Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 1995, 53 (2): 113–127.
• 'Regarding Film Spectatorship: A Reply to Richard Allen,' Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 1998, 56 (1): 63–65.
• 'The Aesthetics of Football,' with Steffen Borge and Margrethe Bruun Vaage, Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, 2015, 9 (2):93–96.

Notes and References

1. https://www.kent.ac.uk/arts/people/academic-staff/smith.html University of Kent, School of Arts staff page
2. http://aesthetics-research.org Aesthetics Research Centre, members page
3. Web site: Works by Murray Smith. Philpapers. 19 April 2019.
4. Web site: SCSMI Board of Advisors. The Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image. 11 May 2012 . 19 April 2019.
5. https://academic.oup.com/screen/pages/Editorial_Board Editorial board of Screen
6. https://academic.oup.com/bjaesthetics/pages/Editorial_Board Editorial Board of the British Journal of Aesthetics
7. https://journals.berghahnbooks.com/projections/editorial/ Editorial Board of Projections
8. https://series.unibo.it/pages/view/commitees Editorial Board of Series
9. Web site: UCHV Announces 2017–18 Visiting Fellows. University Center for Human Values. 19 April 2019.
10. Web site: Murray Smith – From Reflex to Reflection: Experience and Explanation in the Study of Cinema. Kracauer Lectures in Film and Media Theory. 19 April 2019.
11. Web site: The Beacon Institute Lecture 2015 by Professor Murray Smith. Youtube. 13 January 2016 . 19 April 2019.
12. https://liberalarts.temple.edu/news/there-elitism-valuing-aesthetics "Is There an Elitism to Valuing Aesthetics?"
13. Smith. Jeff. Summer 1997. Review: Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion, and the Cinema by Murray Smith. Film Quarterly. 50. 52–53. 10.2307/1213453. 1213453.
14. Pearce. Lynne. 1996. Review: Murray Smith, Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion and the Cinema. Screen. 37. 415–418. JSTOR. 10.1093/screen/37.4.415.
15. Freeland. Cynthia. Cynthia Freeland. 2000. Review: Film Theory and Philosophy by Richard Allen, Murray Smith. The Philosophical Review. 109. 144–147. JSTOR. 10.1215/00318108-109-1-144.
16. Levinson. Jerrold. 2018. Review: Film, Art, and the Third Culture Murray Smith. The British Journal of Aesthetics. 58. 336–341. 10.1093/aesthj/ayx023.
17. Thomson-Jones. Katherine. 2018. Review: SMITH, MURRAY. Film, Art, and the Third Culture: A Naturalized Aesthetics of Film. Oxford University Press, 2017, xiii + 294 pp., 32 b&w illust., $45.00 cloth.. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism. 76. 356–359. 10.1111/jaac.12561. 191502401 .
18. Web site: School history book. 25 February 2016.
19. Web site: Professor Murray Smith, University of Kent. 19 April 2019.
20. Web site: Professor Miri Song School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research – Director of Research. University of Kent. 19 April 2019.
21. Murray Smith, Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion, and the Cinema (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995)https://global.oup.com/academic/product/engaging-characters-9780198183471?cc=us&lang=en&
22. Murray Smith and Richard Allen (eds), Film Theory and Philosophy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997 https://global.oup.com/academic/product/film-theory-and-philosophy-9780198159889?q=film%20theory%20and%20philosophy&lang=en&cc=us
23. Murray Smith and Steve Neale (eds), Contemporary Hollywood Cinema (London: Routledge, 1998 https://www.routledge.com/Contemporary-Hollywood-Cinema/NEALE-Smith/p/book/9780415170109
24. https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/trainspotting-9780851708706/ Murray Smith, Trainspotting (London: BFI Modern Classics, 2002)
25. Murray Smith and Thomas E. Wartenberg (eds), Thinking Through Cinema: Film as Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 2006)https://www.wiley.com/en-gb/Thinking+Through+Cinema:+Film+as+Philosophy-p-9781405154116
26. Murray Smith, Film, Art, and the Third Culture: A Naturalized Aesthetics of Film (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017)https://global.oup.com/academic/product/film-art-and-the-third-culture-9780198790648?q=film%20art%20and%20third%20culture&lang=en&cc=us