Domestication, Agency and the Appeal of the Cute Object

Workshop

A presentation delivered at The Aesthetics and Affects of Cuteness symposium at Northern Arizona University, February 13-14, 2015.

1) I provide a brief overview of the scientific research on cute affect to show how it has influenced scholarship on the aesthetics of cute so far, and what it offers to the future of this scholarship. 

2) I maintain that aggression and violence are attachable to, but not an intrinsic part of, cute aesthetics or affect!

3) A comparison of the English “cute”and the Japanese “kawaii”demonstrates the connotations unique to each. 

4) Newly domesticated Siberian foxes reveal that the capacity for interspecies cooperation is tied at a genetic level to a cute appearance and behavior, allowing me to add important new attributes to the category of “cute.”

5) I’ll present a possible origin of the cuteness response, and ask: where might we go from here?