Collections, Archives, Curiosities. Things and Contemporary Philosophy 3800-KAO23-S-OG

How to respond to the complexity of cultural facts? How to react to the disintegration and chaos of the modern world? How to save the uniqueness and randomness of our experience? The above questions are the leitmotiv of the seminar on the issue of things in contemporary philosophy. We will be particularly interested in the problem of the presence, status and nature of things within such cultural phenomena as collections, archives, relics, curiosities, atlases and catalogues. During the seminar, we will analyze the complexity of the fetish phenomenon, various forms of collecting and organizing things, dismembering, assembling, leftovers, waste, as well as reflection on the individuality of things along with the question of the "alien" world of things.
The impulse and motivation to reflect on this issue was a certain philosophical intuition expressed in the form of a question by Ernst Bloch in one of the essays: "Do objects, apart from their utility side, belong to a foreign world, it must be said, a world from which no one hasn't come to us yet." The anxiety related to the tendency in philosophy to reduce things to a tool or object of cognition, barely signaled here by Bloch, inscribing them into an instrumental context and placing them in a subject-object relationship will be the main theme of the seminar. The presence of things outside the context indicated above is difficult or even impossible to grasp by systematic philosophy. The answer to the helplessness of scientistic trends and projects of Enlightenment philosophy will be to shift the research on the eponymous forms, orders or representations of the presence of things irreducible to the subject-object relationship to the common field of contemporary philosophy, art and literature.

Type of course

elective seminars
general courses

Prerequisites (description)

(in Polish) - lektura przesłanych na zajęcia tekstów - gotowość do dyskusji nad problematyką poruszaną w trakcie zajęć

Course coordinators

Anna Wolińska

Learning outcomes

Knowledge:
student knows and understands:
- to a high degree – research and interpretation methods of philosophical texts.
- some philosophical positions in contemporary aesthetics.
- to a high degree – relations between philosophical ideas and culture.

Skills:
student is able to:
- interpret philosophical texts and compare theses from various sources.
- find relationships between philosophical ideas and social and culture processes.

Socials skills:
student is able to:
- take part in social and culture live.
- demonstrate their interest in contemporary philosophy and its impact on culture and social live.

Assessment criteria

Bibliography

W. Benjamin, „Pasaże”, fragmenty
W. Benjamin, „Rozpakowując moją bibliotekę”, ”, w: tegoż, „Krytyka i narracja. Pisma o literaturze”, Warszawa 2018.
W. Benjamin, „Konstelacje. Wybór tekstów”, fragmenty
E. Bloch, „Ślady”, Kraków 2012, fragmenty
M. de Certeau, „Pisanie historii. Ustanawianie źródeł i redystrybucja przestrzeni”, Archiwum, nr. 3.
G. Didi-Huberman, „Atlas….”
J. Derrida, „Gorączka archiwum. Impresja freudowska”, tłum. J. Momro, Warszawa, fragmenty
U. Eco, „Szaleństwo katalogizowania”, Warszawa 2009, fragmenty.
A. Farge, „Gesty gromadzenia”, w: Archiwum, nr. 2
P. Fédida, „Relikwia i praca żałoby”, Archiwum, nr. 3.
Z. Freud, „Fetyszyzm”, w: tegoż, Dzieła, t. VII, Psychologia nieświadomości, tłum. R. Reszke, Warszawa 2007.
M. Foucault, „Archeologia wiedzy”, tłum. A. Siemek, Warszawa 1977, fragmenty.
M. Foucault, „Słowa i rzeczy. Archeologia nauk”, tłum. T. Komendant, A. Tatarkiewicz, Gdańsk 2000, fragmenty.
A. Leśniak, „Pozostałości archiwum”, Archiwum, nr. 3.
K. Pomian, „Zbieracze i osobliwości. Paryż-Wenecja. XVI-XVIII wiek”, przeł. A. Pieńkos, Warszawa 1996.
J. P. Sartre, „Człowiek i rzeczy”, w: „Literatura na świecie”, nr. 9-10/2006.
B. Shallcross, „Rzeczy i zagłada”, Kraków
K. Steedman, „Przestrzeń pamięci: w archiwum”, Archiwum, nr.2
„Rzeczowy świadek”, red. K. Grzybowska, S. Papier, R. Syndyka, Kraków 2020

Additional information

Information on level of this course, year of study and semester when the course unit is delivered, types and amount of class hours - can be found in course structure diagrams of apropriate study programmes. This course is related to the following study programmes:

Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system:

Description of 3800-KAO23-S-OG in USOSweb