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Tom 2 numer 1

e-ISSN 20841043

Kraków, June 2012, volume 2, number 1

SPIS TREŚCI

Temat wiodący numeru:

Philosophy and Literature:
Generation and Transformation in Gender and Postdependency Discourse

redakcja Urszula Chowaniec i Marzenna Jakubczak

reading woman

Wprowadzenie redakcji

Urszula CHOWANIEC & Marzenna JAKUBCZAK, Conceptualizing Generation and Transformation in Women’s Writing (s. 5-15)

Słowa kluczowe i wkład autorski
Konceptualizacja generacji i transformacji w pisarstwie kobiet. Słowa kluczowe: komparatystyka, kulturoznawstwo, kultura Wschodu, dyskurs Wschód – Zachód, generacja, perspektywa peryferyjna, peryferia, filozofia a literatura, studia interdyscyplinarne, studia postkolonialne, studia postkomunistyczne, postzależność, studia postzależnościowe, pisarstwo kobiet, gender studies
Wkład współautorek: (1) udział w tworzeniu ogólnej koncepcji artykułu wprowadzającego oraz całego tomu, a także wkład w sformułowanie założeń publikacji, określenie zakresu tematycznego i dobór metod (U.C. 50%; M.J. 50%); (2) udział w opracowaniu i redagowaniu trzech artykułów omawiających zagadnienia związane z literaturą Środkowej i Wschodniej Europy (U.C. 90%; M.J. 10%); (3) udział w opracowaniu pozostałych siedmiu artykułów zawartych w tomie (U.C. 10%; M.J. 90%). Badania Urszuli Chowaniec zostały sfinansowane ze środków Narodowego Centrum Nauki (nr DEC1-2011/01/B/HS2/01190) przeznaczonych na realizację projektu pt. „Zrujnowane ciała (e)migrantek, turystek i podróżniczek we współczesnej prozie polskiej (1989-2010). Analiza wątków migracji i bezdomności, melancholi i opuszczenia w literaturze pisanej przez kobiety”.

Artykuły i rozprawy

Część I: Generation and Transformation in Women’s Writing

Ursula PHILLIPS, Generation, Transformation and Place in Inga Iwasiów’s Novels Bambino (2008) and Ku słońcu (2010) (s. 17-35)

Abstrakt
Generacja, transformacja i miejsce w powieściach Ingi Iwasiów Bambino (2008) i Ku słońcu (2010). This paper discusses two novels by contemporary writer Inga Iwasiów (b. 1963), Bambino (2008) and Ku słońcu [Towards the Sun] (2010), in the context of geopolitical, ideological, social and psycho-cultural transformations as they specifically affect different generations of inhabitants of the Polish city of Szczecin (pre-1945 German Stettin) from 1945 until the first decade of the 21st century. Bambino covers the years 1945–1981, but also contains flashbacks to pre-war memory of Stettin and to the suppressed experiences of the new post-war inhabitants, as well as ‘flash-forwards’ to post-1989, post-communist reality; Ku słońcu covers 1981 to the first decade of 2000s. It shows how the novels portray these transformations through the experience primarily of women (but not only) — in Bambino, through the main protagonists: Ula (formerly Ulrike), Anna and Marysia, and through that of the hidden narrator Magda (Marysia’s daughter born in the same year as the author, Iwasiów, 1963); and in Ku słońcu, primarily through the experience of Magda herself, as well as through that of two generations of ‘feminist’ academics: Małgorzata and Sylwia (in which it is hard not to perceive the personal experience of the author, though she is at pains to emphasize elsewhere that her work is a collective biography of the city, not so much of herself). The analysis follows Katarzyna Chmielewska’s supposition that contemporary Polish fiction dealing with the past ‘constantly oscillates between memory and genealogy’, and that it raises raw issues not yet addressed by historians; it also derives inspiration from the new ‘postdependency’ studies proposed by Hanna Gosk and Ryszard Nycz. It also attempts to capture the specific nature of Iwasiów’s use of language, her style of feminism, her method of portraying place, and the connections in her prose between place and memory.
Słowa kluczowe: Polish women’s writing, Inga Iwasiów, postdependency studies, generation, memory

Elena SOKOL, Diverse Voices: Czech Women’s Writing in the Post-Communist Era (s. 37-57)

Abstrakt
Różne głosy: Pisarstwo Czeszek w okresie postkomunistycznym. This essay offers an overview of the diversity of women’s prose writing that emerged on the Czech cultural scene in the post-communist era. To that end it briefly characterizes the work of eight Czech women authors who were born within the first two decades after World War II and began to create during the post-1968 era of ‘normalization’. In this broad sense they belong to a single generation. With rare exception their work was not officially published in their homeland until the 1990s. The writers included are: Lenka Procházková, Tereza Boučková, Alexandra Berková, Zuzana Brabcová, Daniela Hodrová, Sylvie Richterová, Iva Pekárková, and Eva Hauserová. The overview is followed by a concise comparative analysis of texts by three very different writers (Procházková, Pekárková, and Hodrová), using a feminist critical approach. There is also an appendix of works by these writers available in English translation.
Słowa kluczowe: Czech culture, women’s writing, feminist literary criticism, feminism, gender, post-communism

Marja RYTKӦNEN, Memorable Fiction. Evoking Emotions and Family Bonds in Post-Soviet Russian Women’s Writing (s. 59-74)

Abstrakt
Pamiętna fikcja. Wzbudanie emocji i sentymentów rodzinnych w postkomunistycznym pisarstwie Rosjanek. This article deals with women-centred prose texts of the 1990s and 2000s in Russia written by women, and focuses especially on generation narratives. By this term the author means fictional texts that explore generational relations within families, from the perspective of repressed experiences, feelings and attitudes in the Soviet period. The selected texts are interpreted as narrating and conceptualizing the consequences of patriarchal ideology for relations between mothers and daughters and for reconstructing connections between Soviet and post-Soviet by revisiting and remembering especially the gaps and discontinuities between (female) generations. The cases discussed are Liudmila Petrushevskaia’s ‘povest’ Vremia noch [The Time: Night] (1991), Liudmila Ulitskaia’s novel Medeia i ee deti [Medea and her Children] (1996) and Elena Chizhova’s novel Vremia zhenshchin [The Time of Women] (2009). These novels reflect on the one hand the woman-centredness and novelty of representation in women’s prose writing in the post-Soviet period. On the other hand, the author suggests that they reflect the diverse methods of representing the Soviet era and experience through generation narratives. The texts reassess the past through intimate, tactile memories and perceptions, and their narration through generational plots draws attention to the process of working through, which needs to be done in contemporary Russia. The narratives touch upon the untold stories of those who suffered in silence or hid the family secrets from the officials, in order to save the family. The narration delves into the different layers of experience and memory, conceptualizing them in the form of multiple narrative perspectives constructing different generations and traditions. In this way they convey the ‘secrets’ hidden in the midst of everyday life routines and give voice to the often silent resistance of women towards patriarchal and repressive ideology. The new women’s prose of the 1980s–90s and the subsequent trend of women-centred narratives and generation narratives employ conceptual metaphors of reassessing, revisiting and remembering the cultural, experiential, and emotional aspects of the past, Soviet lives.
Słowa kluczowe: emotion, generation, memory, narrative, post-Soviet women’s writing, Russian women’s writing

Suchorita CHATTOPADHYAY, Ashapurna Devi’s “Women” – Emerging Identities in Colonial and Postcolonial Bengal (s. 75-95)

Abstrakt
Kobiety w pisarwstwie Ashapurny Devi – wyłanianie się nowych tożsamości w kolonialnym i postkolonialnym Bengalu. Ashapurna Devi, a prominent Bengali woman novelist (1909–1995) focused on women’s creativity and enlightenment during the colonial and postcolonial period in Bengal, India. She herself displayed immense will power, tenacity and an indomitable spirit which enabled her to eke out a prominent place for herself in the world of creative writing. Her life spanned both colonial India and independent India and these diverse experiences shaped her mind and persona and helped her to portray the emerging face of the enlightened Bengali middle-class woman. Her writings trace the evolution of the Bengali woman as an enlightened and empowered individual struggling against the shackles of discriminatory norms imposed upon her by society. She traces the extremely conservative upbringing that the female members of her generation were subjected to and goes on to show how different individuals responded to these structures in different ways. Some would comply unquestioningly, some would comply simply because they did not dare to protest, while others would break free and find their own niche in the outside world. These issues are addressed by Ashapurna Devi in many short stories as well, but a critical analysis of her trilogy Pratham Pratisruti (1964), Subarnalata (1967) and Bokulkatha (1974) enables us to experience this struggle against a gradually unfolding backdrop where India moves on from being a British colony to an independent country. The trilogy traces the life of three generations of a family — Satyabati, Subarna and finally Bokul and establishes Ashapurna Devi as a path-breaking champion of women’s emancipation in an era when such endeavours were few and far between.
Słowa kluczowe: Ashapurna Devi, Bengali literature, identity, postcolonial studies, subaltern studies

Blanka KNOTKOVÁ-ČAPKOVÁ, Similarities and Differences in Postcolonial Bengali Women’s Writings: The Case of Mahasweta Debi and Mallika Sengupta (s. 97-115)

Abstrakt
Podobieństwa i różnice w twórczości Bengalek w okresie postkolonialnym na przykłądzie Mahashwety Debi i Malliki Sengupty. The emancipation of women has become a strong critical discourse in Bengali literature since the 19th century. Only since the second half of the 20th century, however, have female writers markedly stepped out of the shadow of their male colleagues, and the writings on women become more and more often articulated by women themselves. In this article, I focus on particular concepts of femininity in selected texts of two outstanding writers of different generations, a prose writer, and a woman poet: Mahasweta Debi (b. 1926) and Mallika Sengupta (1960–2011). Analyzing Mahasweta’s female characters, I focus on the issue of the double marginalization of dalit tribal women; we can find here impacts of intersectional discrimination of class, gender and caste. Debi is very radical in her social criticism but is quite reluctant to accept the label of feminism. Mallika, on the other hand, represents a movement among the female writers of her generation that openly declares her support for feminist ideologies, which can be demonstrated on some of the examples referred to here. Another important strand of Mallika’s constructions of femininity are archetypal images — mythological metaphors of femininity (in the Hindu context) which may in some cases be interpreted in accordance with difference feminism, in others as a critique of the essentialized and dichotomous concepts of masculinity and femininity. While Mahasweta’s emancipation drive is more deeply grounded in her field research and journalistic activism in the tribal areas she writes about, Mallika’s has been more strongly linked with the academia and has joined the theoretical feminist discourse. Through a close reading the women’s emancipation discourse of these two protagonists in Bengali literature, we can speak of a shift from a practical, concrete criticism, to a theoretically founded radicalism.
Słowa kluczowe: archetype, Mahasweta Debi/Devi, Bengali literature, feminism, femininity, generation, postcolonial studies, Mallika Sengupta, subaltern studies

Prasita MUKHERJEE, Revolutionizing Agency: Sameness and Difference in the Representation of Women by Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain and Mahasweta Devi (s. 117-127)

Abstrakt
Rewolucjonizacja działania: zbieżności i różnice w sposobie reprezentowania kobiet przez Rokeyę Sakhawat Hossain i Mahashwetę Devi. In this paper the sameness and difference between two distinguished Indian authors, Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain (1880–1932) and Mahasweta Devi (b. 1926), representing two generations almost a century apart, will be under analysis in order to trace the generational transformation in women’s writing in India, especially Bengal. Situated in the colonial and postcolonial frames of history, Hossain and Mahasweta Devi may be contextualized differently. At the same time their subjects are also differently categorized; the former is not particularly concerned with subalterns whereas the latter specifically focuses on the effect of race and class on gender. The quest for the ‘self’ and ‘subjectivity’ is more pertinent in the latter and consequently the appeal for agency is based on a crude power struggle. Hossain, a philanthropist who championed the woman question, believed that striving for equality should be a collective process which could be achieved by spreading awareness among fellow-inmates inhabiting the prison of patriarchy. Like Euro-American first-wave feminists, Rokeya advocated the necessity of education among women in order for them to be able to comprehend their plight and ‘awake’ for the cause. She addresses fundamental issues of feminism like education and the systematized claustrophobia within the domestic space. Whereas Mahasweta Devi, has been an activist writer who is regarded as the brand ambassador for the support of the marginalized, deprived and denotified tribes of India. It is her mission to provide succour to the marginalized sections, especially tribes from the Purulia district of West Bengal, like the Kherias and Shabars. As an activist writer she explores tribal life and allied socio-political issues which reflect their agony.
Słowa kluczowe: agency, colonial studies, Bengali literature, feminism, marginalization, postcolonial studies, subaltern studies, Third World women, powerlessness

Neela Bhattacharya SAXENA, Peopling an Unaccustomed Earth with a New Generation: Jhumpa Lahiri’s Supreme Fictional Journey into Human Conditions (s. 129-150)

Abstrakt
Zaludnianie nieoswojonej ziemi nową generacją: Jhumpy Lahiri niezwykła podróż w głąb ludziej natury. Using a theoretical framework derived from my ongoing engagement with what I have called a ‘Gynocentric matrix’ of Indic sensibility, along with James Hillman’s polytheistic psychology and Wallace Stevens’ notion of a Supreme Fiction, this paper offers a reading of Jhumpa Lahiri’s (b. 1967) short stories beyond postcolonial criticism. Stemming from a depth consciousness where life, living and death, joy, indifference and sorrow, generation, de/re-generation, and transformation are intricately intertwined, Lahiri’s fictional multiverse, opposed to universe, is peopled by a new generation of characters who speak to the soul of the reader, while in the process, she sculpts a reality that does not tolerate any homogenizing impulse in the name of an abstract unity.
Słowa kluczowe: Bengali literature, diasporic writing, feminism, generation, Gynocentric matrix, Jhumpa Lahiri, postcolonial studies

Część II: Changing Paradigms and Stereotypes

Lidia WIŚNIEWSKA, Cleopatra – a Queen, a Lover, a Mother: Transformations of the Image (s. 151-169)

Abstrakt
Kleopatra – królowa, kochanka, matka – transformacja wizerunku. Transformations are not only conditioned by facts encompassing narrower or wider panoramas: from concentrating on death and one (political) role (the ode of Horace), through recalling Cleopatra’s mature life and love (the drama of Shakespeare), to creating an image embracing the heroine’s whole life with its numerous roles, but as a mother and a daughter in the first place, because even her lovers resemble a father and a child (the fictional biography of Karen Essex). Above all, they appear to be more connected with different attitudes towards universal references lying within human cognitive abilities. Horace’s didactic opposition of contradictory patterns leads to the victory of one of them — and it is a linear pattern, as an equivalent of modern myth, which is accepted by the author himself. In Shakespeare, it takes a form of tragedy resulting from the fragmentary character of each pattern, one of which introduces change (archaic myth) and the other constancy (modern myth), and from a painful attempt to combine them. In Essex, the vision of the world in which archaic myth, strongly represented by a child, triumphs is utopian. Irrespective of the differences, all the works realize the essential role played by images developed by heroes, and especially by authors, in human cognition
Słowa kluczowe: archetypes, Cleopatra VII, coincidentia oppositorum, Mircea Eliade, Karen Essex, Horace, image, imagology, mythical patterns, William Shakespeare, transformations

Bijoy MUKHERJEE, Experiments and Research Programmes. Revisiting Vitalism/Non-Vitalism Debate in Early Twentieth Century (s. 171-197)

Abstrakt
Eksperymenty i programy badawcze. Krytyczna analiza debaty między witalizmem a nonwitalizmem toczącej się na początu XX wieku. Debates in the philosophy of science typically take place around issues such as realism and theory change. Recently, the debate has been reformulated to bring in the role of experiments in the context of theory change. As regards realism, Ian Hacking’s contribution has been to introduce ‘intervention’ as the basis of realism. He also proposed, following Imre Lakatos, to replace the issue of truth with progress and rationality. In this context we examine the case of the vitalism — reductionism debate in biology inspired by the works of Indian physicist-turned-biologist Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1937), in the early twentieth century. Both camps had their characteristic hardcores. Vitalists led by John S. Burdon-Sanderson and Augustus D. Waller accepted religious metaphysics to support their research programme, which ultimately degenerated. Bose worked more with the ideals of science such as Occam’s razor, large-scale systematization of phenomena and novel prediction. I argue that his religious metaphysics, instead of acting as a protective shield, helped him to consolidate his position and allowed further problem shift resulting in a research programme that involved consciousness too. His research programme remains relevant even today.
Słowa kluczowe: Jagadish Chandra Bose, realism, theory change, research programme, hardcore, progress, vitalism, nervous mechanism of plants, Sāṃkhya / Sankhya, reformed Vedānta / Vedanta

Antonina ŁUSZCZYKIEWICZ, Kulturowe stereotypy i uprzedzenia wobec Indusów w twórczości Rudyarda Kiplinga (s. 199-221)

Abstrakt
The aim of this paper is to characterize and dispute the cultural stereotypes and prejudices against the Indians depicted in the writings of Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936), one of the most popular British novelists of the Victorian era. The starting point for these reflections is George Orwell’s essay in which he describes Kipling as a racist and imperialist as well as a morally insensitive and aesthetically disgusting figure. To verify this view the present author undertakes an analysis of the cultural stereotypes and prejudices embedded in the selected novels by Kipling. In reconsidering Kipling’s works, she traces the connections between his own world-view and the negative reception of Indians within the Anglo-Indian community by which he was largely shaped. The paper concludes by supporting Orwell’s criticism and demonstrating how Kipling reinforced the stereotype of an Indian, thus reflecting the cultural cliché widespread among the xenophobic and conservative Anglo-Indians in the 19th century
Słowa kluczowe: colonialism, cultural stereotypes, cultural studies, imperialism, Rudyard Kipling, prejudice, George Orwell, Victorian literature, xenophobia

Recenzje

Robert M. MARTIN, W tytule tej książki są są dwa błędy. Katalog zagadek, problemów i paradoksów filozoficznychAlicja KUKUŁA (s. 223-226)

Słowa kluczowe
Robert M. Martin, nauczanie filozofii, propedeutyka filozofii

Autorzy tomu
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