Why is aesthetic education important? He explained in the words of Confucius!

△ Author Ye Xiaowen (data map)

Aesthetic education can cultivate and improve people's ability to feel beauty, the ability to appreciate beauty, the ability to express beauty, the ability to create beauty, and the ability to pursue the interests and ideals of life; aesthetic education extensively and deeply affects people's emotions, imagination, thoughts, will and character, cultivates noble sentiments, and strives to create all beautiful things.

Aesthetic education, also known as aesthetic education. That is, by cultivating people's ability to recognize beauty, experience beauty, feel beauty, appreciate beauty and create beauty, we have the ideal of beauty, the sentiment of beauty, the character of beauty and the quality of beauty.

On August 30, 2018, General Secretary Xi Jinping specifically emphasized in his reply to eight veteran professors of the Central Academy of Fine Arts that aesthetic education plays an important role in shaping a beautiful soul. Beauty is an important source of pure morality and rich spirit. A life without the nourishment of beauty is bound to be monotonous and dry. Confucius believed that education is "flourishing in poetry", "standing in etiquette" and "becoming happy", which contains the importance of aesthetic education.

Why does Confucius emphasize "being happy in poetry, standing in etiquette, and becoming happy"?

"Flourishing in Poetry". Confucius's "Eight Nobles" said: "The giver Shangye! The poems have been completed. It shows that in the life of the country and society, if a person wants to express his thoughts, treat people and things, and cultivate his speech in all aspects, he should start from studying the "Book of Poetry", and only by understanding such perceptual language can he have a feeling of "beauty", can he "paint the aftermath", and cultivate himself with virtue. Today we use the "Chinese Dream" to inspire people's hearts, in a sense, the "flourishing in poetry" of the whole nation.

"Standing in courtesy". The "Rites" are the rules, rituals, and systems of society. The Analects say, "If you do not learn etiquette, you will not be able to stand." Learning etiquette and observing etiquette, from specific perceptual understanding to rational understanding, strictly abiding by the rules of etiquette, in order to self-denial and re-etiquette, in order to straighten out one's body, is to establish also. Today, we strengthen system construction and emphasize institutional self-confidence, which in a sense is the "standing on the courtesy" of the new era.

"Success is fun". Confucius believed that if a person is not benevolent, then the music he plays will not be pleasant. More importantly, "Music" has no scriptures, but lies in the creation of people, a sublimation based on the sensibility of "Poetry" and the rationality of "Rites", and the product of the mutual integration of the two into "people" and "benevolence". Of course, "flourishing in poetry" and "standing in etiquette" are important, but "success" lies in "happiness". In today's view, "music" is not only the "music" of music and the "music" of happiness, but also the "music" of "happiness" that is constantly realized in the universal nobility of morality, the competition of vitality, the exaltation of spirit, and the people's pursuit of a better life.

Human perceptions of aesthetic education are common. The German philosopher Schiller said, "What is truly beautiful must be consistent with nature on the one hand, and with ideals on the other." He strongly advocates cultivating ideal people, perfect people, and people with comprehensive and harmonious development through aesthetic education. Schiller pointed out that both "perceptual impulses" and "rational impulses" are human nature, and perfect human nature should be the harmonious unity of the two, but in modern industrial society, human nature has been split. Therefore, he believes that there is a need for a third impulse, the "game impulse", as a bridge to organically unify the two. Because the "game impulse" is a free and conscious activity of man, it can overcome the restrictions imposed on people by the "perceptual impulse" from the natural necessity; it can also overcome the restrictions imposed by the "rational impulse" from the moral necessity, so that man has a truly perfect human nature. Of course, the "game" that Schiller refers to here does not refer to a real-life game, but to a free and conscious activity as opposed to compulsion, an aesthetic game or an artistic game.

Modernization has generally improved people's material living standards, but the spiritual world has lacked care. People are crowded in a high-paced, seductive modern life, and it is rare to have peace and tranquility. Desire is devouring ideals, change is shaking beliefs, and hearts, spirits, and beliefs are being materialized. When the pursuit of material life transcends the spiritual life, people will lose their way forward. If cultural self-confidence is a more basic, broader, and deeper self-confidence, cultural emptiness is a more serious, more dangerous, and heavier emptiness.

Ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign, the sages' thinking on aesthetic education has never stopped, and these ideas are still of practical significance today. We are making great strides toward modernization, especially in the need to strengthen aesthetic education. Aesthetic education can cultivate and improve people's ability to feel beauty, the ability to appreciate beauty, the ability to express beauty, the ability to create beauty, and the ability to pursue the interests and ideals of life; aesthetic education extensively and deeply affects people's emotions, imagination, thoughts, will and character, cultivates noble sentiments, and strives to create all beautiful things. The great development and prosperity of socialist culture come from the people, from the era of great changes, from the passion and ripples of the spirit of the whole nation, and the great nation will inevitably create a magnificent epic.

(The author is deputy director of the Culture, Literature, History and Study Committee of the CPPCC National Committee)

Source: People's Political Consultative Conference Daily (December 14, 2021, 3rd edition)

Author: Ye Xiaowen

Layout Editor: Si Jinli

Editor: Wei Xinrui

Review: Jiajia Zhou