Hannah Kim Wins John Fisher Memorial Prize

The winner of the John Fisher Memorial Prize for 2023 is Dr. Hannah Kim for her paper entitled "A Dual-Process Model of Xunzi's Philosophy of Music." She will present the paper at the ASA Annual Meeting in Arlington, VA November 15-18, 2023.  Her paper, selected by the JAAC editorial board review committee, will be published in the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism.

Dr. Kim received her PhD from Stanford University and is currently Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Macalester College. She will join the faculty of the University of Arizona this fall. She won the Irene H. Chayes New Voices Award from ASA in 2020.

The Fisher prize, awarded in alternate years to an original essay in aesthetics, was created in memory of the late John Fisher, editor of The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism from 1973 to 1988. The Prize of $1000 and travel to the Annual Meeting is offered to foster the development of new voices and talent in the field of aesthetics. The next Fisher Prize will be awarded in 2025. The deadline for submission is January 15, 2025. Guidelines

The abstract for Dr. Kim's winning paper:

Music, alongside ritual, plays an important role in Confucian moral education. Among all the Confucians, Xunzi gives music the most radical ability to transform people, and this is striking given his pessimistic view of human nature. Though he set the standard for Chinese aesthetics for millennia, there’s no systematic account that brings together Xunzi’s various commitments: that only music from virtuous previous dynasties are morally conducive, that music can bring about lasting character change, that even those uninterested in moral cultivation can benefit from music, and that the “gentleman” and the “petty man” derive joy in different ways while listening to music. In this article, I explain why currently existing accounts can’t capture all the commitments, and I turn to analytic aesthetics to provide a new Dual-Process Model of Xunzi’s philosophy of music. Jenefer Robinson’s discussions of “the Jazzercise effect” and emotional misattribution will be key in the new account. 

Previous Fisher Prize winners

2021 Claire Anscomb
2019 Nemesio García-Carril Puy
2017 Emine Hande Tuna
2015 Jason Leddington
2013 Nick Diehl
2011 Karen Gover
2009 Michael Newall
2007 Barbara Gail Montero
2005 Sherri Irvin
2003 Sondra Bacharach
2001 Rachel Zuckert