Experience and Musical Meaning as a Possibility for Flourishing

A Dialogue Between Roger Scruton and Robert S. Hatten

Abstract

The relationship between music, emotion, and flourishing reveals aesthetic experience as a path to human development. This work brings into dialogue Roger Scruton’s phenomenological approach and Robert S. Hatten’s semiotic perspective. For Scruton, music creates an intentional auditory world where sounds are perceived as expressive forms, and emotion emerges as embodied knowledge shaped by aesthetic listening. In contrast, Hatten emphasizes gesture, topics, and tropes as carriers of culturally and historically situated meaning. While Scruton focuses on subjective experience, Hatten highlights the role of stylistic context in shaping musical meaning. Together, these perspectives show that musical experience integrates emotion, perception, and cultural understanding. This convergence allows music to be understood as a form of embodied thought and a means of self-understanding, contributing to both personal and cultural flourishing. The relationship between music, emotion and flourishing reveals the aesthetic experience as a pathway to human development.