MITOLOGÍA Y CIENCIA FICCIÓN: EL CASO DE MYTHS OF THE NEAR FUTURE DE JAMES G. BALLARD

La relación entre mitología y ciencia ficción es paradójica: si, teóricamente, la ciencia ficción se presenta como opuesta del mito; en su producción narrativa recurre frecuentemente a personajes y esquemas míticos, materializando su dimensión prospectiva a través de la actualización evemerista o alegórica de mitos. Este trabajo revisa críticamente los presupuestos teóricos que escinden la literatura de ciencia ficción de los relatos míticos y la literatura fantástica. A continuación, analizaremos el modo en que James G. Ballard afronta esta cuestión en su narrativa breve, particularmente en Myths of the Near Future, que sobrepasa estas diferencias y plantea un nuevo marco teórico común entre literatura fantástica y mítica y la ciencia ficción. Abstract: The relationship between mythology and science fiction is paradoxical: if, theoretically, science fiction is presented as the opposite of myth; in its narrative production, science fiction frequently resorts to mythical characters and schemes, materializing their prospective dimension through the evemerist or allegorical updating of myths. This work critically reviews the theoretical assumptions that divide science fiction literature from mythical stories and fantasy fiction. Next, it analyzes the way in which James G. Ballard addresses this question in his short narrative, particularly in Myths of the Near Future, which goes beyond these differences and raises a new common theoretical framework between fantasy and mythical literature and science fiction.

Over coding In Disciplines and Fields (After Deleuze) a Call for ‘Dynamic Genesis’ In Tourism Studies and Related Domains

This manuscript applies a cross discilinary cum post disciplinary approach to scrutinising some of the metaphysical insights of French philosopher Deleuze on knowledge-production in the arts, film, literature, and science to like matters of authorial thinking within Tourism Studies. It seeks to translate his expansive thoughtlines on non-representational geophilosophy to the worldmaking agency of Tourism Studies (and related fields) not regarding what tourism is but what it does, notably in terms of how it generally works for institutions and interest groups, and how it specifically effects travellers and host populations, often giving them heavily-striated (i.e., densely-overcoded) visions of peoples/places/pasts/presents. The paper highlights many of the paradoxical dynamic dimensions ingrained within beyond-the-discipline Deleuzian thought, focusing upon his role as an ‘outsider philosopher’ who unsettles commonplace visions of being and identity (within disciplines and domains of 'knowledge') by encouraging both individuals and en groupe populations towards fresh stranger-to-oneself yet creative lines of flight depersonalised understandings. It thereby suggests that the quasi-virtual world of Deleuzian conceptuality (viz.: his paradoxical insights into virtual realms [which are conceivably real without being 'actual' and ideal without being 'abstract']) have much oxygenating relevance to ‘the creative encounter’ possibilities of travel and tourism. The paper thereby has tall relevance for those in other fields who feel distinctly constrained by the dogmatisms of their supposedly parent discipline or domain.

1. Beginnings

‘Beginnings’ traces the growth of schools and assesses the questions that have accompanied that growth. Detailed knowledge about the way schools first operated and the first evidence about the ways people thought about education come from ancient Greece, in the 5th to 4th centuries BCE. Roman schooling broadly followed the Greek model. Meanwhile, the invention of printing was, for the development of thought and education, world changing, leading ultimately to the flowering of interest in art, philosophy, literature, and science that was the Renaissance. The chapter then looks at how Czech teacher Comenius championed universal education. How did schools become instruments of capitalism, the current dominant economic system?

Nikolay Ulyanov's historical and aesthetic position in the context of “DP literature”

Historians attribute the beginning of the scientific and literary activity of the second wave of emigration to the time of the camps for the DP (Displaced Persons).The concept of the “DP literatureˮ is often used as a synonym for the “second waveˮ of Russian emigrant literature. Most of the names of writers who were “displaced personsˮ are not often mentioned in the history of Russian literature and are known only to a narrow circle of specialists. The article examines the special historical and aesthetic position of a prominent representative of this group – Nikolay Ulyanov, justified by a short excursion into his dramatic fate and the history of scientific and literary creative work. Today, in his homeland, Nikolay Ulyanov is better known as a remarkable historian, the author of a few, but unique, scientific works and concepts. And although many of his literary works have also been reprinted and are available to the general reader, the special literary position of Nikolay Ulyanov, which distinguished him in the contradictory literature and science of the second wave, remains not fully studied. The article discusses Nikolay Ulyanov's positioning of himself and his like-minded people as successors and completers of the Russian culture of “Fin de siècleˮ. The disclosure of this provision, an attempt to explain its grounds and consequences for the surrounding Nikolay Ulyanov in a completely different context is undertaken in this article.

Liquid crystal chemistry and poetry

This paper comments on a recent article “Revolutionary poetry and liquid crystal chemistry: Herman Gorter, Ada Prins and the interface between literature and science” by Hub Zwart (Foundations of Chemistry, published online: 10 July 2020), in which the author explores the influence of the liquid crystal research of Ada Prins on the epic poem Pan written by her long-time lover Herman Gorter. The present paper reviews the basic science of liquid crystals and explains the connections between the work of Prins and its influence on the poem. Other examples of the use of “liquid crystal” as a literary device are identified from renaissance poetry, and the uses of the metaphor in these poems are analysed from a scientific perspective. From these examples it is suggested that creative concepts from poetry may contain elements of substance that appear in hitherto unrecognised scientific realities.