beyond the realm of queer lovers:
a personal stance in eroticism & sexuality studies
Sexuality and eroticism, understood as a higher, cultured form of life derived from, and led away from human physiology, has been a frequent topic in humanities in the last few decades. Without going back as far as Freud, the reflection on eroticism led by Georges Bataille proved particularly influential. On the other hand, such currents as queer studies, with its generalised criticism of binarism and categorization, profoundly revolutionised our views on culture.
In many ways, my own studies in eroticism may appear as extremely traditionalist against this background. I'm interested in heterosexual love as a sphere of cultural transgression, especially when it builds upon absence, rather than presence, of the body. This approach is resumed in the title of my endlessly unfinished research project, "Eroticism of Trace", that starts with the absence of Su'ad in the old Arabian qasidah of Kab ibn Zuhayr. Su'ad, as the figure of eroticism, is a being without a body, pure absence, deferral suspended in the temporal void, between "not yet" and "too late", a shape-shifting ghul that feeds on other bodies, taking on their shape.
In many ways, my own studies in eroticism may appear as extremely traditionalist against this background. I'm interested in heterosexual love as a sphere of cultural transgression, especially when it builds upon absence, rather than presence, of the body. This approach is resumed in the title of my endlessly unfinished research project, "Eroticism of Trace", that starts with the absence of Su'ad in the old Arabian qasidah of Kab ibn Zuhayr. Su'ad, as the figure of eroticism, is a being without a body, pure absence, deferral suspended in the temporal void, between "not yet" and "too late", a shape-shifting ghul that feeds on other bodies, taking on their shape.
"Od Ogrodu kochanków Ibn Kajjima al-Dżauzijji do arabszczyzny transkulturowej. Projekt restytucji języka intymnego w pisarstwie Fatemy Mernissi i jego kontynuacje" ["From Rawḍat al-muḥibbīn by Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya to transcultural Arabic. The project of restoring the language of intimacy by Fatema Mernissi and its continuations"], Literatury Azji i Afryki wobec problemów współczesności. Materiały XXXV Zjazdu Orientalistów Polskich, Warszawa, 16-17 XI 2015, Marek M. Dziekan, Agata Bareja Starzyńska (eds.), Warszawa, Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa, 2015, p. 175-188. ISBN 978-83-934631-5-2
| od_ogrodu_kochanków.pdf |
