engleski

Text and Téchnê

This chapter discusses the process of creating popular narration through the process of hiding, or “masking”, the craftsmanship, or what is in the ancient Greek named téchnê (τέχνη). It emerges from the fundamental distinction between high and popular culture and is based on the concept of remediation by David Bolter and Richard Grusin (2000), or precisely the distinction between the two processes of immediation and hypermediation. This model is demonstrated in two cases. The first is the structure of popular computer games, where imme- diation is presented as the mechanism of a “seamless bond” between narration and the algorithm. By contrast, high-culture technotexts are shown as texts in the modernist tradition that often show a special affinity towards non- transparent hypermediacy. The second case is Croatian experimental literature, which serves as an illustration of the popular/high dichotomy injected into the literature as such. The chapter discusses modernism as a specific turn in pictorial represen- tations that can be described through the concept of immediacy/hypermediacy, since modernistic art is radically hypermediated and non-transparent. Following this, the chapter questions the political aspect of such affinity, or technotextual- ity, as the cultural logic of late capitalism. In order to define the phenomenon of l’art’pour’lart – the authentic art that is free from the commercial aspect – the chapter stresses the fundamental distinction between computer games and works of high culture. Finally, the chapter discusses the concept of actuality (ac- tualitas) as a specific characteristic of postmodernity. This horizon defines lit- erature through the highly empirical and pragmatic aspect of téchnê, while its ontological dimension is excluded as sublime and highly theoretical (and for that reason) non- commercial art. In elaborating the problem of actuality, the chapter follows Martin Heidegger, especially his writings on technology (“Die Frage nach der Technik”) as well as his elaboration on the end of philosophy and the task of thinking (“Das Ende der philosophie und die aufgabe des denkens”).

téchnê, popular culture, hypermediation, Heidegger

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