Szekspirowskie przywołania w polskiej literaturze kryminalnej (rekonesans)

Taking into consideration the variety of Shakespearean elements both in world and Polish literature, it is hard to resist the impression that it is the phenomenon without which European culture would be impossible to imagine. At the same time, the writer — whose works not only constitute an important part of Western culture and determine its canon, but also have an influence on current, globalised culture — is perceived as a “dangerous trap”. The above-mentioned danger seems to derive, paradoxically, from the ubiquity of Shakespeare’s works, which are used as a point of reference for modern stories and sometimes treated instrumentally as the “culture brand”. However, it is important to determine if the reception of Shakespeare — present in the socio-cultural aesthetics as well as in the area of paratheatrical avant-garde — among Polish audience is followed by the pop-cultural assimilation of his works. The success on the market of crime fiction whose authors relate to Shakespeare’s works implies the reductio ad absurdum question: how much of Shakespeare remains in these Shakespearean inspirations? Are they really inspirations or is Shakespeare only the brand-author who, due to his name, elevates a given text on the cultural level? If that was the case, we would be experiencing the branding after the pattern of culturally imposed stereotypes. They are in turn assimilated by the popular culture and have a significant impact on the everyday behaviours of the readers — including their attitude towards the past. Thus, tracking the Shakespearean traces within this cultural circuit usually remains a “wishful thinking”, while countless Polish stories (or the ones that the readers know from translations into the Polish language) about “crime and punishment” are the exceptions that prove the rule.

Video games as a screen-interactive platform of historical media education: educational potential and risks of politicization

Screen culture today, absorbing verbal-narrative and written culture, is the dominant memorial-representative format for the reproduction, preservation and broadcast of cultural information. Among the varieties of screen culture, since the beginning of the 21st century, video games have become especially popular and widespread. They possess unique interactive-procedural qualities, which, together with the traditional grammar of screen narrative, create an original complex of rhetorical techniques that effectively influence the mass public consciousness. In turn, the plot and visual design of video games is often based on historical narratives, becoming a platform for virtual interactive reconstruction of history. The study is devoted to the up-to-date topic of analyzing the on-screen phenomenon of video games as an innovative platform for historical media education, identifying its educational potential and the risks of political distortion of history. The methodological basis of the study is cultural-civilizational, dialectical and historical approaches, as well as structural-functional analysis, comparative-political science approach and systemic method. The study made it possible to identify a wide range of historical video games and classify the modalities of the implementation of historical topics in them with its general educational potential. In addition, the fundamental deconstructive nature of the actualization of the historical metanarrative in the procedural-interactive architectonics of video games has been determined. Finally, three main strategies for distorting and falsifying history in video games have been revealed. According to the results of the study, it was revealed that almost every significant cultural and historical era, with an emphasis on military battle plots, is reflected in the video game format. These game projects have serious educational potential, procedurally immersing the gamer in the context of the main historical facts, cultural aesthetics of the era and internal determinants of historical dynamics. At the same time, the postmodern essence of video games has been established, which poses a threat to the invariance of the perception of history, latently encouraging the intentions to rewrite it. Other risks are contained in the identified examples of politicization of the historical narrative of video games, which are concretized in the tendency to belittle the role of Russia in the international arena and the Eurocentric value accentuation.

Varia: Cultural Nationalism and Postcolonial Imperatives in Irene Salami-Agunloye’s Emotan: A Benin Heroine and Emmy Idegu’s Ata Igala the Great

This article examines the efforts of postcolonial creative writers, particularly dramatists, who attempt to rethink the seeming erosion of African culture in the face of western cultural expansion. The present research adopts the methods of descriptive and content analysis, as it dwells on books, journal articles, and internet materials to examine its subject. Of immediate interest are two Nigerian plays, Ata Igala the Great by Emmy Idegu and Emotan: A Benin Heroine by Irene Salami-Agunloye, which are read as paradigmatic texts for interpreting problematic postcolonial relationships. The article contributes to discussions related to colonialism and the hidden agenda of neo-colonialism, which are often interpreted in terms of western economic interests underlying cultural expansion. The article demonstrates how African postcolonial writers have striven to reverse this trend by promoting Africa’s cultural aesthetics as they represent indigenous ways of life and their problematic interaction with western cultural patterns. The discussed works focus on cultural canons related to African life, such as consultation with oracles, ancestor worship, and festivals; and they demonstrate the aesthetic specifics of African dance, music, songs, and their semiotic significance. The article concludes that even though the two plays “speak back” to power, their strength lies in the articulation of certain aesthetic patterns that contribute to African self-location. Thus, the plays not only attempt to assert African culture, but they also strive to rethink the meanings of western cultural imperialism.

Cultural Aesthetic Comparison of "Three Singing Methods"

The art of music is an important part of human culture. Vocal music art is closely related to traditional culture. Different social, historical and cultural factors of different nationalities have injected different ideological and cultural connotations into vocal music art. In their respective cultural atmosphere, vocal music art presents very different forms of expression. The traditional cultural concepts and national psychological consciousness formed under different religious backgrounds affect the traditional artistic concepts and the trend of vocal music art, and finally lead to the differences between Chinese and Western vocal music art and cultural aesthetics.

FROM FOLK TO POPULAR: THE EVOLUTION AND DIFFUSION OF TRUCK ART IN PAKISTAN INTO MAINSTREAM CULTURE THROUGH FASHION INDUSTRY

In this study an analysis is carried out of how Truck Art- an indigenous art form of Pakistan, made its way to popular culture in the form of decorative motifs and items being used in fashion, clothes, and other décor items. The diffusion of truck art into day to day objects can be seen as a cultural shift where one form of art gains popularity by masses to be incorporated in other objects to be enjoyed by masses. This research deals with aesthetic representation of outfitters decorated with truck art styles by focusing on how such styles and articulation of cultural aesthetics add to them in everyday lives. Using a purposive sampling technique, this research gathered data from fashion designers and owners of different apparel brands to explore the motivation and reasons of truck art diffusion. This research illuminates the fact that truck art is not only a form of art, but it also is a platform for the depiction of one’s cultural heritage; hence it has gained popularity not only among artists but also amongst the general public. Thus, this art form flourished and gained popularity amongst masses through its portrayals in different fashion and other consumer items. The study implies that art can be used as a strong medium to bring a change in the society because of its strong influence, and at the same time it can be used to promote cultural industries of Pakistan at global level. Keywords: Fashion, truck art, fashion industry, visual culture, Pakistan.

A Japoniste Friendship in Translation: Hayashi Tadamasa and Philippe Burty (1878–1890)

Art critic and collector Philippe Burty (1830–1890) was one of the first friends the Japanese interpreter (and future art dealer) Hayashi Tadamasa (1853–1906) made on arrival in Paris in 1878. The previously unknown letters translated into English within this essay present Hayashi’s work in Paris (1878) and Brussels (1880), his first impressions of Normandy (1882) and New York (1886), and his explanation of the evolution of Japanese painting (1885). They furnish valuable insights into the cross-cultural aesthetics that led the Japanese, the French, the British, the German, and Americans to collaborate in the development of the phenomenon now known as Japonisme, thereby filling in some of the information gaps surrounding Burty’s international networks and Hayashi’s early years in Europe.

Blue Funk

This chapter examines the development of funk as a distinct concept in black vernacular culture, and explains how blues artists, modern jazz musicians, and political attitudes during the civil rights movement combined to establish the foundation for the musical genre of funk as well as the non-conformist aesthetics and attitudes the music expressed. The central argument is therefore two-fold: that blues artists formulated the concept now known as funk, and that funk became the epistemic centerpiece of a broader cultural aesthetics in black working-class environments. As with the previous chapter, “Blue Funk: The Ugly Beauty of Stank ” foregrounds the central role of kinesthesia in blues-oriented approaches to music-making. Using insights and methods from multiple areas of scholarship, including musicology, ethnomusicology, philosophy, literary criticism, dance criticism, and art history, Bolden explains how the concept of funk and/or precepts associated with funk were not only exemplified in several black musical genres but also dancing, literature, and visual art as well. In this way, black artists working in several mediums contributed to the transformation of “funky” from a stigmatizing signification, that is, a negative, stereotypical expression into a metaphor of black cultural affirmation.