Late Modern Projectivity and Existentialism

Paweł Pieniążek

doi:10.18778/1733-8069.20.1.04

Authors

Paweł Pieniążek University of Lodz, Poland https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5258-7005

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8069.20.1.04

Keywords:

modernity, late modernity, project, existentialism, anxiety, temporality

Abstract

The article addresses the issue of the relationship between existentialism and late modern projectivity interpreted in terms of project work and of biographical projectivity. It does so from the perspective of transformations of subjectivity in modernity and late modernity, and, therefore, from the perspective of the process of individualization. The objective is to answer the question of the belonging of existentialism to one of these sociocultural formations. For these purposes, some major categories of existentialism such as project, anxiety, and temporality are analyzed. Their analysis leads to the conclusion that there is a close, structural correlation between existentialism and sociocultural structures of modernity as well as that existentialism, in contrast to late modern projectivity, has some emancipatory potential related to its alienating status in modernity. The article refers to the methodology of qualitative sociology.

Author Biography

Paweł Pieniążek, University of Lodz, Poland

Philosopher, associate professor at the University of Lodz (Department of Contemporary Philosophy). His research focuses on broadly-defined contemporary and late modern philosophy (French and German) from the existential perspective as well as on the philosophical and cultural aspects of modernity.

References

Baethge Martin (1991), Arbeit, Vergsellschaftung, Identität – Zur zunehmenden normativen Subjektivierung der Arbeit, “Soziale Welt”, vol. 42(1), pp. 6–17.

Bauman Zygmunt (2000), Liquid Modernity, Cambridge: Polity Press.

Bauman Zygmunt (2001), The Individualized Society, Cambridge: Polity Press.

Beck Ulrich (1992), Risk Society. Towards a New Modernity, London: Sage Publications.

Beck Ulrich (2002), Społeczeństwo ryzyka, translated by Stanisław Cieśla, Warszawa: Scholar.

Beck Ulrich (2009), Ponowne odkrycie polityki: przyczynek do teorii modernizacji refleksyjnej, [in:] Ulrich Beck, Anthony Giddens, Scott Lash (eds.), Modernizacja refleksyjna, translated by Jacek Konieczny, Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, pp. 11–78.

Biały Kamila, Piasek Piotr (2024), On social emergence. Non-dichotomous approach to qualitative data analysis, “Przegląd Socjologii Jakościowej”, vol. XX, no. 1 , pp. 18–39.

Birken Thomas (2012), Projektarbeit – arbeitssoziologisch gedeutet, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/288489694_Projektarbeit__arbeitssoziologisch_gedeutet (accessed: 18.12.2022).

Bröckling Ulrich (2005), Projektwelten. Anatomie einer Vergesellschaftungsform, “Leviathan”, vol. 3, pp. 364–383.

Giddens Anthony (1991), Modernity and Self-Identity. „Self” and Society in the Late-Modern Age, Cambridge: Polity Press.

Heidegger M. (1996), Being and Time, translated by Joan Stambaugh, Albany: State University of New York Press.

Rosa Hartmut (2012), Przyśpieszenie społeczne. Etyczne i polityczne konsekwencje desynchronizacji społeczeństwa wysokich wartości, „Ethos”, vol. 99(3), pp. 78–116.

Rosa Hartmut (2020), Przyśpieszenie, wyobcowanie, rezonans. Projekt krytycznej teorii późnonowoczesnej czasowości, translated by Jakub Duraj, Jacek Kołtan, Gdańsk: Europejskie Centrum Solidarności.

Sartre Jean-Paul (1956), Being and Nothingness. An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology, translated by Hazel Estella Barnes, New York: Philosophical Library.

Sennett Richard (2006), Korozja charakteru. Osobiste konsekwencje pracy w nowym kapitalizmie, translated by Jan Dzierzgowski, Łukasz Mikołajewski, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Literackie Muza SA.

Sennett Richard (2010), Kultura nowego kapitalizmu, translated by Grzegorz Brzozowski, Karol Osłowski, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Literackie Muza SA.

Wagner Peter (1995), Soziologie der Moderne, Frankfurt–New York: Campus.