Full text of ER(R)GO nr 36 (1/2018) - utopias/illusion/longings (guest edited by Beata Wojewoda)

Title page and the letter of content of the issue.

Wojciech Kalaga
Institute of English Cultures and Literatures
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice
Poland

Er(r)go…,

ou-topos, a non-place, or perhaps, eu-topos, a good place? In any case, utopia, or contra-utopia, anti-utopia, dystopia, techno-utopia, uchronia, metatopia, allotopia, and finally, computopia. And also ecotopia, a world only potentially good, but this is not the end yet, as there is also multimedia simulation as utopia—humanity’s closed mental circuit, locked into utopothesia, non-places, non-time, vacuum,
infinity and limitlessness, in other words, computerized narcotization. Such is our everyday technoreality: ontological shifts, traverse osmosis of virtuality and reality, a lack of desire to exit creation, deterritorialization of utopia. And earlier, utopian futuro-spasms of the futurists: sempre in avanti, the beauty of speed, a roaring car racing along the ammunition belt of a machine gun, insatiable train stations, broad-breasted locomotives and the gliding flight of aeroplanes. And then anthropologically uncertain Baudrillard asking: “am I a human or a machine?”

Fundamentalist, usurping, toxic utopism (do not, please, mistake it for utopianism) and its two Insufferables. The institutionalization of morality, tracking of enemies and closing of ranks. And what of the utopist? A ludicrous tailor who cuts the client, not the fabric.

Scientific thinking hits culture, and Lem takes advantage of this: an amplifier of intelligence, a gnostic machine, a phantomatic generator and the maker of worlds, teleactor, allplanetarysuperphantomaton, cyberdictatorship, but not of the proletariat, phantomatic debauchery: centrifugal onanism and the technology of facilitated pleasure, and, in consequence, a phantomatized society—stroking one’s ego, eradication of enemies, the abuse of subordinates, bloody dictatorship and the self-destruction of an avatar or relocating into another body, correcting, retouching, falsifications of brain, cerebromatic homicides, and, amongst all of this, Mr. Smith. Corporative utopias—what jerks! Corpomen, Purebloods, Consumers, Fabricants, Adams and Eves, prolerats, Gardeners. Evilpresent World, castes and strata, Prolepolis and Complexes, waterless deluge, corpocide, recycling of clones, and the female Fabricants consuming Amnesiad and Stimulin.

A dangerous matter—HE (human enhancement)—someone wants to improve us! Ontological tinkering: what could we improve in ourselves, what could we correct? It is those transhumanists who tell us to wind our springs, to screw in ourselves. A registered human-cyborg hears colours, and where is the posthuman dignity? Great visions or pragmatism? Theory of salvation, extra-temporal world, a non-place which exists, the pedagogy of virtuous life, eschatological sanction, eternal life, escapist mentality, autosalvation. Or perhaps particle engineering let us create an active, critical, curious citizen, capable of resisting authority and environmental pressure and let us estimate our impotence. We are hungry. What of liberty? “Liberty! You cannot eat that!”

We are entering Silesia, and the re a mythologized cultural symbol—tenement barracks of familoks—but also Arcadia: human, hygienic utopia of Giszowiec, a utopia made real, everyday proletarian happiness (although lonely men get pushed out into a bachelor house), nature, reason, order, harmony and convenience. But even Arcadia must be cleaned, craphouse, dunghill and all. And the (re)constructing of Silesia: the biography of Horst Bienek as distillate. Bienek amongst metaphysical landscapes and protocols from Auschwitz, Bienek’s poetological workshop, modernist textual universe and textualizing strategies, polyphonically open textures, illusions of referential authenticity, poetic realism, the telling of untellable Shoa, kapo, the wheezing of a dying man and the smell of jasmine. Heimatliteratur and professional exiles. Bienek (sur)faces in self-writing and homoerotic titillation escapes into the third person. Aut(h)o(r)biographical (de)scriptions and a narrative game of errors.

In America, already deceased Fuller, the architect of things in motion, duplicates the soul of the universe, dymaxion houses and their cosmic consciousness, dymaxion map and the sacred triad: sacred geometry, sacred technology and the sacred secularity of the world.

And also, here and the re: counterfinality of reason, blessed truth, blindness of technical utopia, personality without body, homo fantomaticus, homo hierarchicus, Human-us. And today’s fashion for ethics: the utopianism of the ethics of value, ethics of virtue, utopian ethical heroism, axiological totalism, hedonistic imperative, the power of values, autonomous conscience, twenty-five visions of a perfect society, liberated captivity, the yoke of slowness, architecture of oppression, the shadow of a ghost city, cognitive capitalism, virtual habitats, obscene surplus of visibility.

The insufferable utopianism of utopism.

Wojciech Kalaga

Tadeusz Miczka 
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice
Poland

Virtual Reality as Utopia 

Abstract: It is assumed, following Łukasz Zweiffel’s idea, that the development of the latest utopias, at least now, is inseparably connected with the ideas of openness and infinity. Former conceptions of closed utopias are replaced by conceptions of open utopias which are based on the belief in the meaning of human freedom and the variety of ways in which future societies may be shaped. The origin of this way of utopian thinking can be found in the theory and creative practice of futurism, artistic avant-garde which since 1909 has strongly influenced not only art but also people’s everyday life. In 1905 F. T. Marinetti wrote about futuristic obsession of freedom (“words-in-freedom”) that cannot concretize fully because “it possesses flexible extension of constantly growing desires.” It becomes common in the epoch of technopoly, especially in its last phase  which is marked by an expansion of high technology. The article focuses on multimedia which are the culmination of development of futuristic thought and art and take the shape of new communication behaviour such as navigation, interactivity and virtualisation. The characteristics of virtual reality (image inclusion and rules binding in Second Life game), which offers multimedia users various forms of experiencing plurality, multidirectional character and especially infofreedom, allows us to consider basic theoretical and practical issues of contemporary studies concerning utopia. According to the author, virtual reality encourages  a development of utopian projects but limits a development of eutopian thinking – alternative for the reality, still realistic but yet better than the reality itself. 

Keywords: utopianism, virtual reality, infoactivity

Grażyna Osika
The Technical University of Silesia
Faculty of Organization and Management
Department of Applied Social Sciences
Gliwice, Poland

The Unbearable Utopianism of Utopism

Abstract: The article critically examines the category of utopianism. It is an attempt to expose its both irremovable and disappointing features that make utopianism an ineffective tool to change the world for better. The rational instruments, unfortunately, are not sufficient to design a eutopia – a place of supreme happiness – because of the fragmentation of points of view taken on utopianism and its persuasive character necessary to disseminate  every utopian vision. The article proposes to replace the utopian methodology for building a better world with so-called piecemeal social engineering and thinking in terms of ecotopia, that is gradual, adaptive changes in the environment of our life. The analysis includes M. C. Nussbaum’s ideas for improving educational systems.

Keywords: utopia, utopianism, ecotopia, piecemeal social engineering

Mariusz Wojewoda
Institute of Philosophy
Faculty of Social Sciences
University of Silesia in Katowice
Poland

Ethics as Social Utopia
An Analysis in the Perspective of the Philosophy of Values

Abstract: The article is devoted to the issue of the presence of the utopian motif in ethics, particularly in ethics based on the philosophy of value. The general point of reference here is the work of the German philosopher Nicolai Hartmann. Normative ethics is intrinsically oriented towards the change of human moral behaviours to an important value (good), especially social good. We are never sure that ethical recommendations will be implemented, therefore, in a way, ethics displays utopian character. However, it does not inhibit formulating ethical programs promoting the change of attitude and behaviour. In the article I distinguish the ethical utopism from utopism. I associate the last one with the classical theories of ideologists of the social life and contemporary specialists in managing organizations. The ethical utopism manifests itself in a certain way of understanding ethical codes as something that institutionally forces attitudes and moral behaviour within a company.

Keywords: philosophy, ethics, applied ethics

Monika Katarzyna Małek-Orłowska
Humanities and Social Studies Section
The Wrocław University of Technology
Poland

A Formula For Good Life
Utopian Concepts in Radical Human Enhancement

Abstract: The author interprets the concept of human enhancement (HE) as a contemporary utopia.  The distinction between radical and moderate approach to enhancement creates the ground for further analysis. The author identifies radical approaches to HE as a utopian pursuit for perfect society and analyzes key utopian postulates assumed especially in transhumanist thought. The comparison of a moderate approach to the radical one indicates that  practical value for such fields as technology assessment and decision making at the socio-political level can be ascribed only to the moderate approach to human enhancement.

Keywords: human enhancement, transhumanism, utopia, technology assessment

For an abstract in Polish, scroll down.

Jacek Kempa
Department of Dogmatic Theology and Spirituality
Faculty of Theology
University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland

Salvation towards History. An Attempt at a Theological Rehabilitation of the Term Utopia

Abstract: Christian theology teaches that eternal salvation cannot be defined in terms familiar to us. Therefore, it can be described as utopia –  in accordance with the etymological meaning of the word. That is how the tension between this and another world, which is present in the Christian teaching, becomes more apparent. Does it cause the depreciation of history, as critics of religion in the 19th century wanted? The article presents some nodal points in the Christian philosophy which are important for the development of the doctrine. They reveal the problem of the relation between earthly life and eternity and highlight the significance of history. In the Church reception,  a reflection which avoided both extremes always prevailed: it did not separate eternal salvation from its connection with history and it did not equate eternal salvation with a stage of history. The article emphasizes  the theological justification of this perspective: it is Christology captured in the frame of the doctrine of the Church and the teaching about the relation between God’s freedom and freedom of a human being.

Keywords:  theology, utopia, salvation, Christology, anthropology

Jacek Kempa
Katedra Teologii Dogmatycznej i Duchowości
Wydział Teologiczny
Uniwersytet Śląski

Zbawienie wobec historii. Próba teologicznej rehabilitacji pojęcia utopii

Abstrakt: Teologia chrześcijańska uczy, że zbawienia wiecznego nie można określić według znanych nam miar. Można je więc określić „utopią” – zgodnie z etymologicznym znaczeniem tego słowa. W ten sposób wyraźnie ujawnia się napięcie między „tym” i „tamtym” światem, obecne w nauce chrześcijańskiej. Czy rodzi ono deprecjację historii, jak chcieli tego dziewiętnastowieczni krytycy religii? W artykule zostaje przedstawionych kilka węzłowych punktów refleksji chrześcijańskiej, ważnych dla rozwoju doktryny, w których dochodzi do głosu problem relacji doczesności do wieczności i w których pada akcent na wartość tożsamości historii. W kościelnej recepcji zawsze zwyciężała refleksja, która unikała obu skrajności: odcięcia zbawienia wiecznego od powiązania z historią oraz sprowadzenia zbawienia wiecznego do etapu historii. Na końcu wskazano na rdzeń uzasadnienia teologicznego takiego ujęcia: jest nim uchwycona w ramy kościelnej doktryny chrystologia oraz nauka o relacji między wolnością Boga a wolnością człowieka.

Słowa kluczowe: teologia, utopia, zbawienie, chrystologia, antropologia

(Abstrakt w języku polskim poniżej)

Beata Wojewoda
Pedagogical College
Technical University of Silesia
Poland

Man in a Phantomatic World
(Summa Technologiae by Stanisław Lem)

Marcin Mazurek
Institute of English Cultures and Literatures
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice
Poland

(Im)Perfect Cities. Utopia and Dystopia
in Selected Representations of Modern Urban Space

Abstract: The article’s departure point is an assumption of a close relationship between the construction of urban space and the projected identity of its inhabitants. Within the context of late-modern architecture this relationship opens up a discursive space for ideologically-motivated and often utopian visions inspired by the modernist desire to produce  a new subject liberated from the socio-historical bias and hierarchical entanglements. Yet upon closer analysis utopian architectural projects – including those represented by literature and the arts – reveal their totalizing aspirations thus blurring the boundary between utopia and dystopia. In the article, the latter is illustrated through a historical analysis of selected literary texts and by particular postulates of modernist architecture included in the Athens Charter and in practical terms represented by large-scale urban housing projects, such as Katowice’s Millennial Housing Estate whose critical evaluation takes place against the background of broader cultural operations reflected in the concept of cognitive capitalism. The last part of the paper is devoted to the phenomenon of virtualization of urban space and its translocation to the virtual sphere, which – following both postmodern critics and virtual culture theorists – becomes a new model of individualized urban existence.

Keywords: architecture, appartment block, utopia, dystopia, ideal city, literature, industrial revolution, Victorian era, spectacle, simulacrum, cognitive capitalism, virtual city, identity

Izabela Kaczmarzyk
The Ignatianum Academy
Cracow, Poland

Utopia of a Working-class Arcadia?
(Based on Hermann Reuffurth’s Giszowiec. Nowa górnośląska wieś górnicza [Giszowiec. A New Upper-Silesian Coal-Mining Village]).

Abstract: The article is an attempt to understand the category of utopia with reference to the accomplished architectural project of Giszowiec (Gieschewald) – a patronal company town situated in Upper Silesia. The starting point of the reflections on the character of Giszowiec is the concept of happiness by W. Tatarkiewicz who in his work “Analysis of Happiness” („O szczęściu”) claimed that it could be achieved only if everything was well-planned and rational in life. These two rules – of rationality and precision in the arrangement of every detail of the estate, so that all its inhabitants (the workers of Bergwerksgesellschaft Georg von Giesches Erben industrial concern) could lead happy and peaceful everyday lives – were the basis of Zillmans’ architectural project. The project itself involved a housing estate of small cottage-like houses situated in a woody area and it resulted from pragmatism. It was a means of developing the sites which were rich in coal deposits. Nevertheless, it created an interesting architectural concept referring to the idea of a garden city, which made it possible to approach in an innovative way the issue of workmen’s housing provided by one of the biggest industrial concerns at the beginning of the 20th century.

Keywords: Upper Silesia, industrial heritage, regional studies

Daniel Juliusz Pietrek
Institute of German Language and Letters
Faculty of Philology
The University of Opole
Poland

Upper Silesia as a Myth and Utopia in the Works of Horst Bienek

Abstract: Horst Bienek was  a very well known and influential personality in the literary circles in Germany. His works are also important for the history of Silesian literature because of his role in the intraGerman and German-Polish discourse about the homeland, history and identity. In the article the author presents poetical strategies and  methodology which Bienek  used while creating his mythic representations of Silesia and (at the same time) of himself.

Keywords: literary history, German literature, Silesian literature, Horst Bienek, utopia

Maria Anna Banaś
The College of Foreign Languages
The Technical University of Silesia
Gliwice, Poland

Homo Hierarchicus in Modern Utopia 
(on the Basis of The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood and The Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell)

Abstract: The paper explores the hierarchical model of society as shown in the dystopian novel The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood and in one of the narratives of Cloud Atlas – Orison of Sonmi 451 by David Mitchell. The chief aim of the paper is to identify both similarities and differences  manifested in the construction of the social world. A special emphasis has been placed on  the role of a hierarchical order present in these narratives which has a direct impact on the structure of  communities operating within  the social world. In the analysis the author refers to the theory of a  French sociologist and anthropologist Louis Dumont, who sees hierarchy as a fundamental principle organizing social life typical of traditional societies and  perceived as an anomaly and deviation  in Western culture, and to the model of social structure as shown by Jacek Szmatka, who sees it as an indispensable tool in grasping and understanding processes taking place within the community.

Keywords: sociology of literature, utopia, social stratification

Bartłomiej Knosala
Faculty of Organization and Management
The Technical University of Silesia
Gliwice, Poland

Buckminster Fuller and His Work
From Technological Utopia to Sacred Technology

The article presents the work of American visionary Buckminster Fuller in the context of his project of technological utopia. Analyzing the assumptions underlying this project (the so-called Comprehensive Anticipatory Design Science), we note that Fuller's thought is a form of reference to the ancient category of logos. In his approach,  the reconciliation of individual logos with common logos takes the form of humanity's adaptation to the "nature operating system", with technology being the tool for this adaptation. At the same time, referring to the interpretation of Fuller's ideas proposed by Scott Eastham, the author shows that Fuller's understanding of technology is related to the so-called sacred geometry. When approached from this perspective, technology and spirtuality can be seen as merging into a coherent whole.

Keywords: Buckminster Fuller, utopia, technological utopia, sacred geometry, Scott Eastham

For an abstract in Polish, scroll down.

Piotr Bogalecki
Department of Comparative Literature
Institute of Polish Literature
University of Silesia in Katowice

With the Left Hand. Polish Theoreticians of Concrete Poetry as Concrete Poets (Józef Bujnowski, Tadeusz Sławek, Piotr Rypson)

Abstract: The present article, inscribing itself into the field of literary anthropology (as projected by Danuta Ulicka) and attempting at a neo-avant-guard re-interpretation of Polish post-war poetry (inspired chiefly by H. Foster's propositions), is dedicated to the oeuvre of three notable scholars of concrete poetry in Poland. Even though the theoretical propositions put forth by Józef Bujnowski (especially those presented in 1970s), Tadeusz Sławek (1980s) and Piotr Rypson (1990s) would determine the directions of the reception of concrete poetry over three subsequent decades, their intermedial, visual and auditory poetic experiments either remain unknown or have been forgotten. Bringing them back to the forefront of the academic attention and subjecting them to an analysis, the author of this article argues that taking such text into account in the diachronic study of the Polish literary culture does not only enrich the existing narratives oscillating around Polish concrete poetry and allow their reinterpretation, but also makes visible a number of research problems, of which the most important are related to the role played by authors who simultaneously are involved in literary scholarship and in writing, especially in the context of the neo-avant-guard shift of the borders between institutionalized scholarship and art.

Keywords: concrete poetry, essayist literary scholarship, limits of art, limits of scholarship

Piotr Bogalecki
Katedra Literatury Porównawczej
Instytut Nauk o Literaturze Polskiej
Uniwersytet Śląski w Katowicach

Lewą ręką. Polscy teoretycy poezji konkretnej jako konkretyści (Józef Bujnowski, Tadeusz Sławek, Piotr Rypson)

Abstrakt: Wpisujący się w projektowaną przez D. Ulicką antropologię literaturoznawstwa oraz stanowiący próbę neoawangardowej reinterpretacji polskiej poezji powojennej (inspirowanej głównie propozycjami H. Fostera) artykuł Lewą ręką poświęcony jest artystycznej działalności trzech ważnych badaczy poezji konkretnej w Polsce. Chociaż ich teksty teoretyczne określały kierunki jej recepcji przez trzy kolejne dekady – propozycje Józefa Bujnowskiego zwłaszcza w latach 70., Tadeusza Sławka w 80., a Piotra Rypsona w 90. – podejmowane przez nich intermedialne, wizualne i dźwiękowe, eksperymenty poetyckie pozostają albo nieznane, albo zapomniane. Przypominając je i omawiając, autor artykułu argumentuje, że ich uwzględnienie nie tylko wzbogaca i zreinterpretować pozwala istniejące narracje poświęcone kształtowaniu się polskiego konkretyzmu, ale i uwidocznia kilka niebagatelnych problemów badawczych, spośród których najistotniejsze związane są z rolą autorów uprawiających zarówno pisarstwo literaturoznawcze, jak i literackie, w neoawangardowym przemieszczaniu zastanych granic instytucji nauki i sztuki. 

Słowa kluczowe: poezja konkretna, pisarstwo literaturoznawcze, granice sztuki, granice nauki 

Małgorzata Poks
Institute of English Cultures and Literatures
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice
Poland

The Bible of Jonah: On Decolonization of Christianity in the North American Context

A review of the book: Buffalo Shout, Salmon Cry: Conversations on Creation, Land Justice, and Life Together. Steve Heinrichs (red.). Kitchener, Ontario i Harrisonburg, Virginia, Herald Press 2013, pp. 360.

Keywords: dekolonialism, religious anthropology, cultural anthropology, interculturality, natural environment

[Scroll down for the Polish version of the Abstract]

Małgorzata Szumna
Faculty of Polish
Jagiellonian University, Poland

Unbearable Lightness of Writing

A review of the book: Ryszard Koziołek, Dobrze się myśli literaturą, Wydawnictwo Czarne, Wołowiec 2016. (Publication in Polish).

Keywords: a book review, Ryszard Koziołek, Dobrze się myśli literaturą

Nieznośna lekkość pisania

Abstrakt: Recenzja książki: Ryszard Koziołek, Dobrze się myśli literaturą, Wydawnictwo Czarne, Wołowiec 2016.

Słowa kluczowe: recenzja, Ryszard Koziołek, Dobrze się myśli literaturą

[Scroll down for the Polish version of the Abstract]

Anna Kisiel
Institute of English Cultures and Literatures
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland

Jeffrey Weeks, What is Sexual History? (A Critical Note)

Abstract: The present note concerns the book by Jeffrey Weeks, What is Sexual History?, first which aims at sketching out, and then tracing the paths of the history of sexuality to finally organize our knowledge about these phenomena and processes. The main part of the book consists of seven chapters dealing with various aspects and and subsequent stages of the formation of the discipline of sexual history and its changing social conditioning.

Keywords: sexuality, history of sexuality, gender studies

Jeffrey Weeks, What is Sexual History? (Nota o książce)

Niniejsza nota traktuje o książce Jeffrey'a Weeksa, What is Sexual History?. Książka ma na celu nakreślenie, prześledzenie i uporządkowanie historii seksualności. Główna część książki składa się z siedmiu rozdziałów, traktujących o różnych aspektach i etapach tworzenia dyscypliny oraz jej uwarunkowaniach społecznych.

Słowa kluczowe: seksualność, historia seksualności, gender studies

Michał Kisiel
Institute of English Cultures and Literatures
Faculty of Philology
University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland

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