http://hdl.handle.net/11320/9210 2026-06-20T18:47:34Z http://hdl.handle.net/11320/9217 Tytuł: Heliopolis: Lisa Jarnot’s rewriting of a legendary city Autorzy: Tardi, Mark Abstrakt: In her second book Ring of Fire, American poet Lisa Jarnot offers the reader a dynamic sixteen-poem sequence entitled Heliopolis. Jarnot’s Heliopolis uses the legendary City of the Sun as a starting point, but rather than describe or depict the life of antiquity, Jarnot considers the city as an ongoing posthuman vortex where animals perform a range of implausibly or absurdly anthropomorphic actions. Moreover, Jarnot’s recursive poetic structures both heighten the rhythmic and ludic qualities of the actions described while toggling between poignant humor and ethical confrontation. This essay seeks to examine what the social and ethical implications are in Jarnot’s reimagining of this legendary city. Moreover, the work of Cary Wolfe, Donna Haraway, and others within posthumanist discourse will be considered as a critical lens into how Jarnot is leveraging playfulness and anthropomorphism. Why does Jarnot consistently (re-)present non-human animals in her poems? How do her stylistic gestures collapse distinctions between physical and temporal boundaries? 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/11320/9216 Tytuł: The airstream futuropolis: Hauntological reading of Gibson’s “The Gernsback Continuum” Autorzy: Moryń, Jan Abstrakt: This article focuses on William Gibson’s s hort story “The Gernsback Continuum”, and its reading that may be arrived at through the employment of hauntology. Gibson’s story happens in cityscapes of the American Southwest — its urban areas are turned here into a site of struggle between the disillusioned present and the ever-recurring visions of a glorified future. Among the problems tackled by this article is the nature and history of Art Deco architecture and design of the 1930s, the expectations that the Americans of the 1930s had for the future, and the influence that the surviving relicts of the bygone period still exert on the urban dwellers. This article presents hauntology as a theory capable of producing a captivating reading of the story based on the works of Jacques Derrida, Mark Fisher, and Andrzej Marzec. 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/11320/9215 Tytuł: The habitat of crime – Random Acts of Senseless Violence from the criminological perspective Autorzy: Mednis, Klara Abstrakt: This article analyses Jack Womack’s Random Acts of Senseless Violence from the perspective of criminological research focusing on the correlation between criminality and the environment, i.e. the particular areas where either criminals reside, or where the crimes are committed. The ideas of the ecological school of criminology (the Chicago School), especially the studies by Shaw and McKay and their predecessors, and the so-called “Broken Windows” theory by Wilson and Kelling are introduced. The paper shows that the neighbourhoods depicted in Womack’s novel might be seen as models exemplifying, albeit in a rather extreme manner, the processes presented in the aforementioned theories. This article demonstrates how the link between high crime rates and the social disorganisation of communities inhabiting specific areas may provide a possible explanation for the drastic transition of the novel’s protagonist into a violent criminal. 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/11320/9214 Tytuł: Illusionary safe havens: The role of the city and the country in Zelda Lockhart’s Fifth Born and Fifth Born II: The Hundredth Turtle Autorzy: Łapińska, Magdalena Abstrakt: Fifth Born and Fifth Born II: The Hundredth Turtle, written by the African-American author Zelda Lockhart, create a duology whose characters make many physical and spiritual journeys. In the story whose setting alternates between St. Louis, New York, and rural Mississippi, the city and rural areas both seem to be treated as a potential safe haven from the secrets and violence created and cultivated by the other place. This article explores the correlation between geography and emotion in Zelda Lockhart’s Fifth Born duology. Beginning with sketching an outline of the historical context of the idea of city versus non-city in African American literature, and then briefly illustrating the notion of Emotional Geographies, the article explores the role which the city and the country play in connection with the characters’ abuse, focusing specifically on sexual violence. 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z