ABSTRACT
The most general statement that can be made about John Dewey’s philosophy is to say that for him life was experience, and experience was two things: a vision of man as an organism which was creative and responsive in its relations with nature, and a vision of society as part of the natural surroundings of man. It is quite accurate to regard Art as Experience as a primer of Dewey’s ideas, for what he has to say in this book about aesthetic events is only an extensive illustration of his general philosophy of human acts. As he so tirelessly repeated, man was a live creature, an organism linked to the surroundings by relations of dominance over it, defense against it, or acquiescence with it. Even ideological issues were discussed by him in the language of organic adjustment. A sound sociology of cultural life requires first an accountable view of the social element itself.
