Transfigurations of Contemporaneity

Ovaj je rad osmišljen kao analiza dijela mišljenja američkoga filozofa Fredrica Jamesona. Opus tog autora obuhvaća desetine naslova od kojih će u elaboraciji teme tri biti fragmentarno obrađena, odnosno u svakoj od njih ću posvetiti pozornost jednom poglavlju (i djelomično njihovim uvodima). Riječ je o sljedećim trima knjigama i pripadajućim poglavljima: The Signatures of the Visible (s prvim poglavljem u knjizi »Reification and Utopia in Mass Culture«), Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (s tekstom iz šestoga poglavlja »Space: Utopianism After the End of Utopia«) i A Singular Modernity (s poglavljem, odnosno prvim dijelom knjige, »The Four Maxims of Modernity«). Namjera je rada tekstove ovih poglavlja istaknuti kao momente jednog zamišljenog ekskursa o opsegu i dubini pitanja o identitetu suvremenosti, odnosno njegovih suvremenih transfiguracija izraženih Jamesonovim tezama. Protežući se u daljnjim razradama onkraj čvrsto utvrđenih definicija i neprestanog preispitivanja metode istraživanja, ta pitanja nalaze svoju pozadinu u promišljanju koncepata i pojmova narativa i povijesnosti. Očito je da uvođenje koncepta i pojma narativa u relaciji prema povijesti evocira klasični pristup tom problemu, no ovdje je riječ upravo o njegovim suvremenim transfiguracijama koje su izražene u tim poglavljima. Namjera rada je, stoga, uz očigledne analitičke momente spomenutih tekstova, istaknuti i kritičku ulogu takve analize, s jedne strane. No, s druge strane, namjera je ukazati i na istraživanja čiji je smisao daljnje kritičko i analitičko propitivanje i utvrđivanje teorijskih polazišta koja ne ustrajavaju samo na spekulativnim postulatima vezanim uz spomenute probleme, koja ne teže tek jednoj novoj metadiskurzivnosti, već teže propitivanju mogućih istraživačkih putova koji se neizbježno pojavljuju u spomenutim transfiguracijama, kako teorije tako i neizbježnih praksa koje ih obilježavaju.This paper is generally conceived as an analysis of some fragmentary parts concerning the thought of American philosopher Fredric Jameson. The opus of this author includes tens of titles but only three of them will be elaborated here in some fragments (more precisely, I will elaborate on one of the chapter from each book respectively). The books in question are the following: The Signatures of the Visible (especially first chapter in the book titled “Reification and Utopia in Mass Culture”), Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (text from the sixth chapter titled “Space: Utopianism After the End of Utopia”) and at the end there is A Singular Modernity (first chapter titled “The Four Maxims of Modernity”). My intention in this paper is to propound texts from those chapters as moments of one imagined digression about scope and depth of question which is asked about identity of contemporaneity, or rather, its contemporary transfigurations expressed through Jameson’s theses. In further elaborations this issues spreads beyond firmly set definitions and continuous examination of the method of research, and finds its foundation in reflecting concepts and notions of narrative and historicity. It is obvious that introducing concepts and notion of the narrative in relation to history evokes classical approaches to this problem, but the point here is precisely its contemporary transfigurations which are couched in these chapters. The intention of this paper is therefore also, beside obvious analytical moments in mentioned texts, to point out critical role of such analysis, on the one hand. But, on the other hand, the intention that lies in it is to indicate research point of which is further critical and analytical questioning and ascertaining theoretical starting points that do not hold on only to speculative postulates related to mentioned problems, and which do not tend only to one new meta-discursiveness, but tend to question up possible research paths that unavoidably show up in mentioned transfigurations, concerning both theory and unavoidable practices that mark them as well