The 2005 Conference of the Rocky Mountain Division of the American Society for Aesthetics was held July 8-10 at the historic Hotel St. Francis, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Activities on the 8th began with conference registration and Opening Remarks by President Manson. The Division was delighted to welcome Professor Curtis Carter, Secretary/Treasurer of the American Society for Aesthetics, Marquette University. The Division welcomes critical papers in all fields and disciplines, pertaining to the history, application and appreciation of aesthetic understanding. We are always particularly interested in research into interdisciplinary and intercultural approaches emphasizing the natural character of the American Southwest. Sustaining the interdisciplinary character of the Division’s work, papers and discussions explored topics deriving from the fields of contemporary and historical aesthetics, art history, women’s studies, English literature, media studies, aesthetics and postmodernism, American literature, sociology, theatrical performance, fiction, motorcycling, studies of the American Southwest, architecture, South Asian literature, contemporary museology, religion, classical and popular music, cinema, philosophy, Peirce studies, and others.

The 2005 conference program was composed as follows: Issues in Ethics and Literature (Eva Dadlez and Leon Higdon); Literary Investigations (Steven Salmoni, Jacky Dumas and John Samson); The Aesthetics of Travel (Richard McLamore and George Moore); The Aesthetics of Place and Space (Carol Gould, Jill Mulholland and Norman Fischer); The Reception of Art ( Ted Kafala, James Hamilton and Noel Boulting); Contemporary Issues in Aesthetics (David Levine, Raphael Sassower and Louis Cicotello, and Frances Downing); Aesthetic Issues in 17th Century Literature (Lewis H. Whitaker, Nicholas Nownes, and Linda Dove); Issues in Southwest Aesthetics (Bob Frye and Rueben Ellis); Philosophical Investigations (James Mock and Arthur Stewart)

The Manuel Davenport Keynote Address was given by Allen Carlson on “Art, Institutional Theory and the Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature.” The plenary session on the artist at work was Jinni Thomas, a visual artist from Albuquerque, speaking on “In the Manner of a Rose.”