Militarizing and Colonizing Outer Space as a Video Game. Ender’s Game and Astroculture

The author of the article analyzes Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, focusing her attention on the relationship between the key motif of the novel – gaming – and the tendency to militarize and colonize outer space highlighted by astrocultural scholars. Card’s novel follows the astrocultural pattern of setting future wars in space, but introduces an important novelty: games of various kinds, including video games, become a mediating element between the characters and the real experience of space war. The theoretical framework for the analysis is provided by the insights of astrocultural scholars such as Alexander Geppert, Tilmann Siebeneichner and Alice Gorman. In analyzing Ender’s Game and, to some extent, its 2013 film adaptation, the author examines the protagonists’ relationship to space, which is shaped by the game’s setting. It is here that military and colonial themes are most prevalent. The first part of the paper presents the main contexts of the motif of the militarization of outer space and its close relationship with video games. These contexts provide an important background for the analysis of the motifs of games and outer space in Ender’s Game. Selected reflections from the field of ludology are helpful in interpreting Card’s use of video games not only as a theme, but also as a structural principle of his novel’s settings. In the last part of the paper, the author considers the transformation of the militant motif taking place in the novel’s finale into a narrative focused on the colonization of outer space, as well as the transformation of this narrative that occurred in Gavin Hood’s film adaptation. The goal of such an interpretation is to show the story created by Orson Scott Card as entangled in a dynamic relationship with the video game medium that was developing at the time of its creation and with the changing trends of astroculture.The author of the article analyzes Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, focusing her attention on the relationship between the key motif of the novel – gaming – and the tendency to militarize and colonize outer space highlighted by astrocultural scholars. Card’s novel follows the astrocultural pattern of setting future wars in space, but introduces an important novelty: games of various kinds, including video games, become a mediating element between the characters and the real experience of space war. The theoretical framework for the analysis is provided by the insights of astrocultural scholars such as Alexander Geppert, Tilmann Siebeneichner and Alice Gorman. In analyzing Ender’s Game and, to some extent, its 2013 film adaptation, the author examines the protagonists’ relationship to space, which is shaped by the game’s setting. It is here that military and colonial themes are most prevalent. The first part of the paper presents the main contexts of the motif of the militarization of outer space and its close relationship with video games. These contexts provide an important background for the analysis of the motifs of games and outer space in Ender’s Game. Selected reflections from the field of ludology are helpful in interpreting Card’s use of video games not only as a theme, but also as a structural principle of his novel’s settings. In the last part of the paper, the author considers the transformation of the militant motif taking place in the novel’s finale into a narrative focused on the colonization of outer space, as well as the transformation of this narrative that occurred in Gavin Hood’s film adaptation. The goal of such an interpretation is to show the story created by Orson Scott Card as entangled in a dynamic relationship with the video game medium that was developing at the time of its creation and with the changing trends of astroculture

Ciemna strona Polski? : "neo-noir" i kino policyjne w twórczości Patryka Vegi

The transcultural aspect is an important feature of the new cinema noir (neo-noir). In contemporary pop culture neo-noir has become one of the dominant trends, easily adapting to the local conditions of national cinematography. The article is devoted to one of the Polish films that fall into this category. Films and TV series by Patryk Vega refer to neo-noir and the convention of American police films. Genologic considerations aside, the author looks at the nature of the connections between Polish neo-noir and American film. Is police film of the neo-noir variety merely an inspiration for Vega, or does it undergo reinterpretation and an attempt at adaptation of Hollywood conventions? Or perhaps we should look at the work of the director as a kind of imitation of fashionable aesthetics? The author tries to settle these doubts by analysing selected works by Vega, including those made for the cinema (“Pitbull”, “Special Forces”) and those made for television (among others: “Instinct”, “Dark Side of the City”)

Bezdroża i ruiny : Flandria Bruno Dumonta

The paper presents Bruno Dumont’s vision of Flanders. A French director from Bailleul makes no comments on today’s situation of the region, nor does he directly speak of its history. However, he uses its landscape in many different ways in the process of constructing his tales of contemporary post-secular world. In such films as The Life of Jesus, Humanity and Flanders, as well as in TV series L’il Quinquin and Coincoin and the Extra-Humans, locality and topography of Flanders play the role of a microcosmos in which problems observed in the macro scale may be clearly seen

Alternative splicing and gene polymorphism of the human TAP3/SEC14L4 gene

Three closely related human SEC14p-like proteins (hTAP1, hTAP2, hTAP3, or SEC14L2, SEC14L3, SEC14L4, respectively) have been described that are related to the Saccharomyces cerevisiae SEC14 protein. These proteins may participate in intracellular lipid transport and influence regulatory lipid-dependent events. Here we report the isolation of an alternatively spliced hTAP3 cDNA and a polymorphism within the coding region of the hTAP3/SEC14L4 gen

Sztuka iluzji - recenzja

Recenzja: Justyna Hanna Budzik, Filmowe cuda i sztuczki magiczne. Szkice z archeologii kina, Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego, Katowice 2015

Dumontland : pejzaż duchowej pustyni

W niniejszym eseju autor chciałaby pokazać, że pejzażowy wątek ściśle wiąże się z charakterystyczną dla kina Dumonta refleksją nad rzeczywistością, w której tradycyjne systemy wartości zostały zakwestionowane lub wręcz zdegradowane. Funkcjonujące w tych dziełach krajobrazy nie służą kontemplacji w rozumieniu kina tradycyjnych duchowości. Panoramy prowincjonalnych miasteczek nie tchną tu spokojem, lecz marazmem, a natura nie jest (tylko) źródłem piękna lub poczucia równowagi – często skrywa ohydę pierwotnych instynktów i spektakl brutalnej śmierci. W pewien sposób jej żywotność i zdolność do cyklicznego odradzania się kontrastują z wewnętrzną pustką cywilizacji naznaczonej poczuciem kresu

Obszary tabu w kinie biblijnym głównego nurtu

The article focuses on the presence / the absence of taboo in mainstream biblical film. Except for Henry Koster’s The Story of Ruth, the genre usually avoids presenting Jewish or Christian strict interdictions in an open way. In the same time the films are strongly marked with the presence of unmentionable themes concerning the erotic, customs an aesthetics. The author shows some changes in presenting taboo in biblical film during the years by analyzing classical movies (Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments, Henry King’s David and Bathsheba) as well as the contemporary ones (Mel Gibson’s The Passion of Christ, Darren Aronofsky’s Noah, Ridley Scott’s Exodus: Gods and Kings)

Neo-noir : ciemne zwierciadło czasów kryzysu

Neo-noir. The Dark Reflection of the Times of Crisis is a book devoted to problems of new film noir genre. In the opening part, the author recapitulates previous definitions of this phenomenon, simultaneously proposing her own understanding of neo-noir as an aesthetics developing dynamically especially in the times of the broadly understood crises. The following chapters are of interpretative character. The author illustrates how neo-noir diagnoses crises present in the contemporary culture: identity, gender and epistemological crises, as well as these connected with doubt about humankind. The new cinema noir seems to be a reaction to all the questions regarding the status of film as a medium, and to crises affecting genres and conceptions of film authorship. The last chapter is devoted to “neo- -noir touches” – the author follows the traces of elements of this aesthetics, among others, in the works of Atom Egoyan, in the Polish cinema and the contemporary film pop-culture, including the one which may be defined as design cinema. Although the author grounds her analysis mainly in the film examples, she also refers to selected comic books (Joker by Brian Azzarello and Lee Bermejo), video games (L.A. Noire), music videos (Who Is It? by Michael Jackson), and even advertisements (BMW series: The Hire). The book not only contains studies and interpretations of works defined as retro-noir (such as The Postman Always Rings Twice by Bob Rafelson or The Black Dahlia by Brian De Palma), whose authors pay tribute to the classical black cinema, but also of numerous science fiction movies, (Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, Terminator and Matrix cycles, and Battlestar Galactica series), thrillers (Basic Instinct by Paul Verhoeven or Jagged Edge by Richard Marquand), and comic book adaptations (Christopher Nolan’s cycle about Batman and Robert Rodriguez’s Sin City). Simultaneously, the author refers to both Western and Asian cinematography (i.e. Hong Kong, Korean, Japanese and Indian)

Wielość gwar śląskich źródłem bogactwa regionu

Zróżnicowanie współczesnych gwar śląskich odpowiada podziałowi przyjętemu przez K. Nitscha (1960), poza nieobecnością wymarłych na tym terenie dialektów laskich. Gwary na Śląsku wzbogaciły się natomiast o gwarę południowokresową, której używają głównie repatrianci, mieszkający na wsi (i w mniejszych miejscowościach) od Katowickiego po Wrocławskie. Analiza językowa danej gwary ustalana jest nadal na podstawie mowy mieszkańców, a więc w oparciu o kryterium uzualno-funkcjonalne. Otwiera to perspektywę badań nad językiem za pomocą paradygmatów korzystających z modelu użycia języka jako podstawy metodologicznej opisu (ang. usage-based models of language), takiego jak kognitywizm, socjolingwistyka czy dialektologia. Najbardziej powszechna w użyciu jest polszczyzna mieszana, w której odmiana gwarowa przeplata się z ogólną, zróżnicowana także stylowo (np. styl potoczny i naukowy), stąd ważna jest w badaniach tego typu aplikacja paradygmatów bazujących na uzusie językowym, pozwalającym ukazać język w procesach społeczno-kulturowych (np. dromologii, mediamorfozy i glokalizacji tj. globalizacji i lokalizacji zarazem). W ustalaniu cech gwarowych przydatna jest też teoria prototypu E. Rosch, pozwalająca wykrywać cechy kanoniczne (prototypowe) danej gwary, zwykle fonetyczne, pozwalające ją wyróżnić kryterialnie od innej gwary. Tradycyjny podział gwar śląskich uległ pewnym przemianom, związanych z przesunięciem wpływów gwar śląskich w stosunku do mało- i wielkopolskich, rozszerzenia się obszaru mieszanego o charakterze pogranicza gwar, utrwaleniu polszczyzny mieszanej przy zawężeniu liczby osób posługujących się tylko gwarą. Zróżnicowanie gwar jako prestiżowej odmiany polszczyzny na Śląsku świadczy o bogactwie doświadczeń regionalnych tych ziem i wymaga dalszego całościowego badania przemian językowych zachodzących na obszarze Śląska.

Twórczość Chrisa Eyre'a w kontekście problemów filmowych adaptacji

Chris Eyre is a native American independent filmmaker. Some of his films are based on the books by Sherman Alexie and Tony Hillerman. At the same time, Eyre adapts American mainstream film genres (road movies, sport movies) in order to revise cinematic representations of the native Americans. The author of this article analyses such films as Smoke Signals, The Edge of America, Skinwalkers and We Shall Remain, trying to define the role and meaning of different adaptation strategies in Eyre’s works. In Smoke Signals and The Edge of America the director pictures and discusses the most important issues of modern Indian identity. In this context his films seem to prove that the dominant cinematic representations of native Americans are changing