Lorenzo Marinucci
Tohoku University, Graduate School of Letters and Arts, Faculty Member
- University of Rome Tor Vergata, Lettere e filosofia, Department Memberadd
- Oriental Studies, Philosophy, Phenomenology, Aesthetics, Haiku, Continental Philosophy, and 24 moreJapanology, Japanese Studies, Queer Theory, Sexuality, Media, Popular Culture, Film, Literature, Poststructuralist Theory, Feminist Theory, Gender Studies, Literatura, Haikai, Traducción, Historia, Oriente, Ethics, Poetry, Ontology, Asian Studies, Heidegger, Gernot Böhme, Smell, and Olfactionedit
Following the Footsteps of Wind: Some Remarks on Kuki Shūzō’s Philosophy of Aesthetics, with a Translation of Kuki Shūzō’s “A Reflection on Poetic Spirit” (Fūryū ni kansuru ikkōsatsu 風流に関する一考察) Lorenzo Marinucci
Research Interests:
Ogawa Tadashi (1945) is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy in Kyoto University's School of Human and Environmental Studies. An expert of phenomenology and German philosophy, his work represents an original synthesis of Western philosophy... more
Ogawa Tadashi (1945) is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy in Kyoto University's School of Human and Environmental Studies. An expert of phenomenology and German philosophy, his work represents an original synthesis of Western philosophy and East Asian notions of body and ki. His other research interests include structuralism (from a phenomenological strandpoint), sociology, and the political thought of Machiavelli.
Research Interests:
This essay is a phenomenological analysis of the meanings expressed by the character 色 (Jp. iro/shiki, Ch. sè). They include "color, " "love, " "eroticism, " "sensuous beauty," and even "phenomenon." Is this overlap fortuitous, or can we... more
This essay is a phenomenological analysis of the meanings expressed by the character 色 (Jp. iro/shiki, Ch. sè). They include "color, " "love, " "eroticism, " "sensuous beauty," and even "phenomenon." Is this overlap fortuitous, or can we reach a deep insight on these apparently disparate elements by reflecting on 色? Does the East Asian approach to color qua desire reveal something essential about both color and desire, heavily downplayed within European philosophy? I will address this phenomenological issue through five sections. First, we will consider Husserl's description of plena and Merleau-Ponty's reflection on sexuality as metaphysics; then, the role of color as a paradigm for emotion in Japanese aesthetics will be addressed. Both these discourses will offer a new perspective on the Heart Sutra's equation of 色 and "emptiness" (空). We will argue how and why Goethe's theory of color shows a distinct affinity with these Asian sources. Lastly, I will highlight the interplay of all these elements in Kuki Shūzō's The Structure of Iki. Color and eroticism are ultimately connected as the pre-formal and yet transcendental disclosure of the world: central paradigms for viewing experience itself as relation and immersion.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This is a video of a talk by Lorenzo Marinucci (Sapenzia University of Rome) for the "Haiku as World Literature: A Celebration of the 150th Birthday of Haiku Poet Masaoka Shiki", which took place on October 12 & 13, 2017 at... more
This is a video of a talk by Lorenzo Marinucci (Sapenzia University of Rome) for the "Haiku as World Literature: A Celebration of the 150th Birthday of Haiku Poet Masaoka Shiki", which took place on October 12 & 13, 2017 at Barristers Hall, Boston University. Recorded on October 12, 2017 by the Geddes Language Center.
Research Interests:
This chapter offers an introduction to three fundamental atmospheric notions deployed by Japanese culture, observing them both in their original context and through a neophenomenological frame. The three concepts are that of 空 ku- “sky”,... more
This chapter offers an introduction to three fundamental atmospheric notions deployed by Japanese culture, observing them both in their original context and through a neophenomenological frame. The three concepts are that of 空 ku- “sky”, 風 fu- “wind” and 気 ki “air” or “breath”. Each of them, however, shows an impressive complexity and a wide array of meanings, many of which, despite the puzzling effect on a non-Asian reader, are highly coherent. Why is the character for “sky” also the signifier for the Buddhist notion of emptiness and imagination? Why is “wind” both the chief element of “landscapes”, a signifier for the aesthetic in general and having even the sense of “culture”? Is ki, with its impressive use for phenomena both bodily and psychic, external and internal, an actual phenomenon in the world? Despite the risk of exoticizing the cultural difference of non-European sources or the opposite refusal of these notions as “totally other”, the potential of a cross-cultural pheno...
Research Interests:
The tenth volume of the Frontiers of Japanese Philosophy focuses on the theme of “transition,” dealing with transitory and intermediary phenomena and practices such as translation, transmission, and transformation. Written in English,... more
The tenth volume of the Frontiers of Japanese Philosophy focuses on the theme of “transition,” dealing with transitory and intermediary phenomena and practices such as translation, transmission, and transformation. Written in English, German and Japanese, the contributions explore a wide range of topics, crossing disciplinary borders between phenomenology, linguistics, feminism, epistemology, aesthetics, political history, martial arts, spiritual practice and anthropology, and bringing Japanese philosophy into cross-cultural dialogue with other philosophical traditions. As exercises in “thinking in transition,” the essays reveal novel modes of doing philosophy as a way of boundary crossing that takes transition not only as an object of inquiry, but also as a method of philosophical practice itself.
Research Interests: Aesthetics, Art History, Feminist Theory, Japanese Philosophy, Embodiment, and 15 morePhenomenology, Martial Arts, Zen Buddhism, Martin Heidegger, Photography Theory, Imagination, Nishida Kitarō, Relationality, Translation, Somaesthetics, Nishitani Keiji, Hatano Seiichi, World Philosophies, Maruyama masao, and Ueda Shizuteru
The category of sabi is one of the most distinctive forms of Japanese aesthetics. A spiritual love for age, solitude and melancholia, it is central to practices like tea ceremony and haikai poetry: however, a formal description of its... more
The category of sabi is one of the most distinctive forms of Japanese aesthetics. A spiritual love for age, solitude and melancholia, it is central to practices like tea ceremony and haikai poetry: however, a formal description of its character is often deemed impossible. The Japanese philosopher Onishi Yoshinori (1888 - 1959) was however convinced that sabi was a complex but coherent category, and that a philosophical approach to sabi in Japanese poetry could reveal in its structure a mixture of affirmation and negation that brought it close to Romantic irony. Together with yugen and aware , sabi is one of the three Asian aesthetic categories proposed by Onishi ’s intercultural system as counterparts to the European forms of beautiful, sublime and comic. In this essay we turn to his 1940 vol ume Fugaron , still mostly ignored by Western bibliography, to discuss the outlines of Onishi ’s analysis of sabi , its background, its difficulties and intellectual potential.
Research Interests:
Saggio introduttivo per l'edizione italiana di "Note su Basho" di Akutagawa Ryunosuke, a cura di E. Follador e L. Marinucci, Vita Felice 2022
Research Interests:
In this article I will attempt a definition of “resonance”: first reflecting about it in general terms and then trying to address its role in Japanese aesthetics, in particular poetics. While far from being limited to East Asian aesthetic... more
In this article I will attempt a definition of “resonance”: first reflecting about it in general terms and then trying to address its role in Japanese aesthetics, in particular poetics. While far from being limited to East Asian aesthetic expressions, I will show how the experience of “resonance” has played a comparatively more central role in this cultural context, shaping peculiar forms of poetry. It is therefore useful to observe non-European sources, if only to understand our hidden cultural assumptions before this kind of phenomenon and suspend our prejudices more effectively in examining it. After examining the use of atmospheric resonance in waka and in renga I will focus on haikai 俳諧 poetics and on the notions of hibiki 響き (echo) and nioi 匂い (scent) in the theoretical discussions on poetry among Matsuo Bashō 松尾芭蕉 (1844-1894) and his disciples.
What is the role and structure of breathing within embodiment? The topic here is explored in a comparative, phenomenological approach. While the traditional mind-body divide and the Greek idea of an internal, disembodied psyche have been... more
What is the role and structure of breathing within embodiment? The topic here is explored in a comparative, phenomenological approach. While the traditional mind-body divide and the Greek idea of an internal, disembodied psyche have been dominant in European thought, in the Chinese-Japanese cultural nexus air-like phenomena and breathing are acknowledged as essential aspects of human experiences. The aim of this paper is presenting a first sketch of such a phenomenology of breathing through premodern and modern non-Western (mostly Japanese) sources, ultimately showing how such an aesthetic attunement to the breathing body was a central element of Homeric sensibility as well.
Research Interests:
This is a video of a panel discussion on Shiki's poetics with Anna Elliott (Discussant): Rebekah Machemer, Lorenzo Marinucci & J. Keith Vincent for the "Haiku as World Literature: A Celebration of the 150th Birthday of Haiku Poet... more
This is a video of a panel discussion on Shiki's poetics with Anna Elliott (Discussant): Rebekah Machemer, Lorenzo Marinucci & J. Keith Vincent for the "Haiku as World Literature: A Celebration of the 150th Birthday of Haiku Poet Masaoka Shiki", which took place on October 12 & 13, 2017 at Barristers Hall, Boston University. Recorded on October 12, 2017 by the Geddes Language Center.
In this article I will attempt a definition of "resonance": first reflecting about it in general terms and then trying to address its role in Japanese aesthetics, in particular poetics. While far from being limited to East Asian aesthetic... more
In this article I will attempt a definition of "resonance": first reflecting about it in general terms and then trying to address its role in Japanese aesthetics, in particular poetics. While far from being limited to East Asian aesthetic expressions, I will show how the experience of "resonance" has played a comparatively more central role in this cultural context, shaping peculiar forms of poetry. It is therefore useful to observe non-European sources, if only to understand our hidden cultural assumptions before this kind of phenomenon and suspend our prejudices more effectively in examining it. After examining the use of atmospheric resonance in waka and in renga I will focus on haikai 俳諧 poetics and on the notions of hibiki 響き (echo) and nioi 匂い (scent) in the theoretical discussions on poetry among Matsuo Bashō 松尾芭蕉 (1844-1894) and his disciples.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This paper analyzes the theme of "mood" through a double genealogy of its underlying metaphors. Among the European roots employed today to frame this concept (or non-concept, we should say: but the haziness of moods is an important part... more
This paper analyzes the theme of "mood" through a double genealogy of its underlying metaphors. Among the European roots employed today to frame this concept (or non-concept, we should say: but the haziness of moods is an important part of their environing force) I will focus in particular on the Latin one, humor, still visible today in the Italian and French. On a diachronic axis, I will highlight how the peculiar meaning of humor, with its stress on a strange and non-objective materiality, bodily and cosmic at the same time, allows us to rediscover a surprising phenome-nological insight even in the half-forgotten theories of elemental attunement that characterized most European history. On a synchronic axis, I will show how this hyletic approach to mood is also active in East Asia, where the "stuff" of emotions is qi/ki 気, literally "air": the word kibun 気分, used in Japan as equivalent to the English "mood", is "a partition/understanding of ki". Underneath the veil of exotic-ness, the Asian notion too arises out of a qualitative observation of the spatial, hyletic quality of moods: not an internal state of the subject nor a quality of already objectified things, mood/humor/kibun points to the fundamental disclosure of both world and subjectivity in a dynamic atmosphere.
Research Interests:
The category of sabi is one of the most distinctive forms of Japanese aesthetics. A spiritual love for age, solitude and melancholia, it is central to practices like tea ceremony and haikai poetry: however, a formal description of its... more
The category of sabi is one of the most distinctive forms of Japanese aesthetics. A spiritual love for age, solitude and melancholia, it is central to practices like tea ceremony and haikai poetry: however, a formal description of its character is often deemed impossible. The Japanese philosopher Ōnishi Yoshinori (1888-1959) was however convinced that sabi was a complex but coherent category, and that a philosophical approach to sabi in Japanese poetry could reveal in its structure a mixture of affirmation and negation that brought it close to Romantic irony. Together with yūgen and aware, sabi is one of the three Asian aesthetic categories proposed by Ōnishi's intercultural system as counterparts to the European forms of beautiful, sublime and comic. In this essay we turn to his 1940 volume Fūgaron, still mostly ignored by Western bibliography, to discuss the outlines of Ōnishi's analysis of sabi, its background, its difficulties and intellectual potential.
Research Interests:
Fudo, letteralmente "vento e terra", è un concetto chiave della filosofia di Watsuji Tetsuro. Qui le intuizioni e la proposta della fenomenologia dello spazio di Watsuji vengono messe in dialogo con un possibile corrispondente europeo,... more
Fudo, letteralmente "vento e terra", è un concetto chiave della filosofia di Watsuji Tetsuro. Qui le intuizioni e la proposta della fenomenologia dello spazio di Watsuji vengono messe in dialogo con un possibile corrispondente europeo, l'idea di genius loci.
Research Interests:
What is the role and structure of breathing within embodiment? The topic here is explored in a comparative, phenomenological approach. While the traditional mind-body divide and the Greek idea of an internal, disembodied psyche have been... more
What is the role and structure of breathing within embodiment? The topic here is explored in a comparative, phenomenological approach. While the traditional mind-body divide and the Greek idea of an internal, disembodied psyche have been dominant in European thought, in the Chinese-Japanese cultural nexus air-like phenomena and breathing are acknowledged as essential aspects of human experiences. The aim of this paper is presenting a first sketch of such a pheno-menology of breathing through premodern and modern non-Western (mostly Japanese) sources, ultimately showing how such an aesthetic attunement to the breathing body was a central element of Homeric sensibility as well.
Research Interests:
Introduction to the Italian translation of "Fudo" (Mimesis, 2015)