Iconocentrism

DEFINITION

Iconocentrism is the belief or attitude that images (or icons) are or should be the central element in the universe. Images play the most important role, other things (the deity, people, objects, or text, perhaps) being subservient to them. Iconocentric is the adjectival form.Quote: "Since the days of Greek philosophy sight has been hailed as the most excellent of the senses. The noblest activity of the mind, theoria, is described in metaphors mostly taken from the visual sphere. . . . Sight, in addition to furnishing the analogues for the intellectual upperstructure, has tended to serve as the model of perception in general and thus as a measure of other senses." Hans Jonas, The Phenomenon of Life, Toward a Philosophical Biology (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), p. 135.Also see analogue, anthropocentrism, ethnocentrism, and sight.