Steven Shaviro Bücher

An examination of science fiction narratives and the light they shed on human life, the unknowable future, and the vagaries of unforeseeable change. With this book, Steven Shaviro offers a thought experiment. He discusses a number of science fiction narratives: three novels, one novella, three short stories, and one musical concept album. Shaviro not only analyzes these works in detail but also uses them to ask questions about human, and more generally, biological life: about its stubborn insistence and yet fragility; about the possibilities and perils of seeking to control it; about the aesthetic and social dimensions of human existence, in relation to the nonhuman; and about the ethical value of human life under conditions of extreme oppression and devastation. Shaviro pursues these questions through the medium of science fiction because this form of storytelling offers us a unique way of grappling with issues that deeply and unavoidably concern us but that are intractable to rational argumentation or to empirical verification. The future is unavoidably vague and multifarious; it stubbornly resists our efforts to know it in advance, let alone to guide it or circumscribe it. But science fiction takes up this very vagueness and indeterminacy and renders it into the form of a self-consciously fictional narrative. It gives us characters who experience, and respond to, the vagaries of unforeseeable change.

Engages new currents in critical interpretations of contemporary film practice.

Post-Cinematic Affect is about what it feels like to live in the affluent West in the early 21st century. Specifically, it explores the structure of feeling that is emerging today in tandem with new digital technologies, together with economic globalization and the financialization of more and more human activities. The 20th century was the age of film and television; these dominant media shaped and reflected our cultural sensibilities. In the 21st century, new digital media help to shape and reflect new forms of sensibility. Movies (moving image and sound works) continue to be made, but they have adopted new formal strategies, they are viewed under massively changed conditions, and they address their spectators in different ways than was the case in the 20th century. The book traces these changes, focusing on four recent moving-image works: Nick Hooker's music video for Grace Jones' song Corporate Cannibal; Olivier Assayas' movie Boarding Gate, starring Asia Argento; Richard Kelly's movie Southland Tales, featuring Justin Timberlake, Dwayne Johnson, and other pop culture celebrities; and Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor's Gamer.

How does science fiction imagine forms of life that are plausible, and yet different from anything that we already know?

Jedná se o první a zásadní publikaci, která se zabývá aktuálním tématem post - internetového umění. Náš svět je světem objektů a možná si to uvědomujeme více než kdy dřív. Právě v éře globálního oteplování, umělé inteligence, masově vyráběných a neustále inovovaných či individualizovaných výrobků jsme konfrontováni s tím, že nejen lidé existují, jednají a mají práva. Také objekty, naše planeta, živočišné druhy, počítačové aplikace i nám blízké každodenní předměty se hlásí o své slovo. Kniha s charakteristickým názvem Objekt se snaží z pozic filosofie a teorie médií shrnout různé pohledy na tuto explozi objektů. Snaží se objektům propůjčit hlas. Kniha tak představuje první soubor textů z proudu spekulativního realismu, objektově orientované ontologie, akceleracionismu a nového materialismu dostupný v českém překladu.