"...psychologia ludzka łączy się z siłami nadprzyrodzonymi" - erotyzacja relacji męsko-męskich w prozie Michała Choromańskiego : między fabularnym wabikiem a próbą psychologizacji

The article is an attempt to characterize the ways homosexuality was presented in Michał Choromański’s prose. The author of Zazdrość i medycyna is often described (also in his own words) as “the last author of Młoda Polska period” whose main area of interest are complicated heterosexual relations overviewed through Otto Weininger-like mysoginic lenses. However, besides presenting dangerous and seductive femmes fatales Choromański also concentrated on representation of monosexual relationships with special devotion to male homosexuality. This aspect of his writing has been neglected or marginalized in literary analyses. The author tries to depict homosexuality as an important element present in Choromański’s oeuvre on three different levels: as a disturbance of the plot’s structure, as a problem of language (the figure of paralypsis) and finally as a problem of modern crisis of “homo/heterosexuality definition” (Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick)

Ile Geneta w Gombrowiczu? Piotr Seweryn Rosół: “Genet Gombrowicza. Historia miłosna.” Gdańsk: Fundacja Terytoria Książki – Słowo/Obraz Terytoria, 2016, ss. 458 - recenzja

The review sums up Piotr Seweryn Rosół’s book devoted to the relation between Witold Gombrowicz and Jean Genet. Despite his critical overtone, the author does not explicitly assess Rosół’s book. He argues with the general idea but notices ambitious intentions and interesting interpretations, which prevents him from rejecting the book as such. On the one hand, Rosół’s work bears the hallmarks of Gombrowicz studies truisms, and on the other hand, it renews some interpretations as it suggests that Gombrowicz uses Genet to “outline” the shape of generally avoided issue of homosexuality. Rosół’s book proves that certain way of critical reading of Gombrowicz is no longer valuable and although he attempts to transgress the traditional critical approach, he does it inconsistently

Masculinity, Disability, and Politics in Polish War-Disabled Memoirs (1971)

This article off ers a contextualized analysis of disabled Polish war veterans’ memoirs published in 1971. This set of documents constitutes a remarkable source for understanding how masculinity and male corporeality are narrated and negotiated between politics, social and family lives, private and public spheres. The article focuses on the conventions and conditions of war-disability discourse production in Poland during the long sixties; it also highlights biographical tensions between appreciation of veterans’ masculinity in political discourse and their often emasculated position in social structures, families and private lives

Between traditions and technology: political radicalism and the spectacle of masculinity in contemporary Poland

Radical movements of the Polish far-right consist, as elsewhere, mainly of young men. The strict gender binarism, the exaltation of men’s power, homosociality, brotherhood, physical strength and subordination of women are omnipresent among ‘angry white men’ everywhere, Poland included. However, these general characteristics have always its local variants, trajectories, and particularities. This article is an attempt to explain the phenomenon of Polish radical right movements in its local context: cultural, social, economic. The article focuses on ‘The March of Independence’ – a cyclical celebration for radical groups, which proliferates the discourses of far-right radical masculinity. In the first part, the author focuses on the social and economic background, worldview and ‘masculinist’ ideology of Polish’ angry white men’ (Kimmel 2013). The second part focuses on the historical and cultural coding of their ‘aggrieved entitlement’ (Kimmel 2013). The third part of the essay draws on Steve’s Garlick (Garlick 2016: 163−193) concept of ‘spectacular masculinity’. It analyzes how modern technology contributes to the construction of ‘spectacular’ masculinity among the participants of the march/members of radical groups

„Muszę robić to, co zawsze chciałem robić: myśleć.” - z Didierem Eribonem rozmawia Wojciech Śmieja

„Muszę robić to, co zawsze chciałem robić:myśleć” - z Didierem Eribonem rozmawia Wojciech Śmiej

Refiguracje męskości w „narracjach prostatycznych”

Jednym z najbardziej rozpowszechnionych rodzajów nowotworu jest dotykający wielu mężczyzn nowotwór prostaty. Jako dotykający nie tylko cielesności, ale także społecznej i kulturowej tożsamości mężczyzny długo pozostawał w sferze tabu, choć od czasu eseju Susan Sontag Choroba jako metafora dokonuje się w kulturze Zachodu stopniowa detabuizacja raka. W ostatnich latach obserwujemy uobecnianie się „dyskursu prostatycznego” przez jego literackie zapisy, kulturowe reprezentacje, akcje świadomościowe czy wreszcie publiczne debaty. Ten moment jest interesujący dla badacza‑literaturoznawcy: „dyskurs prostatyczny” analizować trzeba na przecięciu kilku relatywnie nowych subdyscyplin nauk humanistycznych i społecznych: krytycznych studiów nad mężczyznami i męskościami, age studies i dyskursu maladycznego. Sięgając do tych trzech obszarów, autor poddaje lekturze powieść Duch wychodzi Philipa Rotha, powieść L’ablation Tahara Ben Jellouna (I wyd. 2014, nietłumaczona), esej/dziennik Philippe’a Petita: Philosophie de la prostate (wyd. 2018, nietłumaczona). Na podstawie przeprowadzonych analiz autor formułuje wniosek, że dokonujące się na naszych oczach rozpoznanie prostaty jako ważnego obszaru męskiej cielesności może przyczynić się do znaczących przesunięć w rozumieniu kulturowych i społecznych konwencji męskości

Queerowanie Freuda, queerowanie Lacana? : o queerowo-psychoanalitycznych użytkach i nieużytkach

The article focuses on different attitudes towards psychoanalysis within the frames of queer theory. Is psychoanalysis conservative power serving stabilisation of social order or has it subversive potentiality which goes hand in hand with queer politics? How Judith Butler, Leo Bersani, Lee Edelman, Didier Eribon and other queer theorists use psychoanalytical tools in their writings? What are the similarities between Lacanian psychoanalysis and Foucauldian “history of sexuality” understood as the starting point of queer theory? Are psychoanalytic ideas rooted in given social conditions (as Oedipus complex) useful in describing queer reformulations of relationships and social conditions which “produced” psychoanalysis? The author tries to answer abovementioned questions but the answers are always partial and unsatisfactory as the relation between queer theory and psychoanalysis is tortous and sophisticated: queer thinking can cut psychoanalysis off (as Didier Eribon proposes) but it can be psychoanalytically motivated as well (as in Lee Edelman's theoretical proposals)

Antynomie męskości i erotyczne spojrzenie na męskie ciało w "Agnieszce, córce Kolumba" Wilhelma Macha

Wilhelm Mach’s novel Agnieszka, córka Kolumba [Agnes, Columbus’ Daughter] (1965) has now largely been forgotten, like the author’s other works, yet, in the 1960’s it used to be highly controversial and provoked numerous arguments. This paper brings the novel back into focus and analyzes the ambiguous and internally incongru-ous concept of masculinity it presents. The analysis concerns the novel both in the wider contexts of the ideological and aesthetic discussions of the 1960s, and in relation to the author’s earlier works. The author’s personal view on the form of a novel was highly interesting as he conceptualized a well-crafted novel as a “gendered” one: the “masculine” dimension of the epic had to be balanced by the “feminine” element en-capsulated in the concentration on details, emotionality, and attentiveness. These ideas being put into practice, “the feminine” in Agnieszka is realized by the romantic plot and eroticization of the constructed-as-feminine gaze on the masculine body, yet under the heteronormative and patriarchal regime the eroticization of this body disrupts the “masculine” narrative and results in an artistic failure and the omnipresent misunder-standing of the author’s intentions

Męskie fantazje - od freikorpsów do wszechpolaków. Klaus Theweleit: “Męskie fantazje.” T. 1: Kobiety, strumienie, ciała, historia. T. 2: Męskie ciała. Przyczynek do psychoanalizy białego terroru. Przeł. Mateusz Falkowski, Michał Herer. Przekład przejrzał Arkadiusz Żychliński. Warszawa: PWN, 2015, ss. 972 – recenzja

The classic study of the German social anthropologist is discussed in the context of different trends in “masculinity studies”. The reviewer demonstrates that “male fantasies,” analysed by Theweleit, are not solely a historical phenomenon, but nowadays – in a slightly modified form – can urge young men to (often dangerous) actions. Moreover, Theweleit’s book is also worth reading because throughout almost the whole previous century the Polish variant of masculinity has been referring to the hegemonic German masculinity as its antithesis

Rana/męskość

"Znak / między słowami „rana” i „męskość” dowodzi naszej wyjściowej konfuzji. Żaden spójnik nas nie satysfakcjonował: i, a, wobec, w. Znak / – ukośnik, samą swoją formą przypomina cięcie, bliznę, szramę, jest sygnałem ambiwalencji dzielenia-łączenia, rozcinania i zszywania i, jako taki, chyba najwierniej oddaje nasze intencje oraz intuicje dotyczące sposobu wiązania dwu tytułowych kategorii trzeciego numeru „Rany”." (fragm.