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"Genius loci" - and man's hegemonic ambitions,

Publikacja / Publication
Sławek Tadeusz Maria
Adres publikacji w Repozytorium URL /
https://opus.us.edu.pl/info/article/USLe2e143bfbed54feca3370d299cc8fc87/
Publication address in Repository
Data opublikowania w Repozytorium /
6 lut 2024
Deposited in Repository on
Rodzaj licencji / Type of licence
Sławek Tadeusz Maria: "Genius loci" - and man's hegemonic ambitions, In:
Cytuj tę wersję / Cite this version "Genius loci" mappa della ricerca = mapa badań = research map, 2010,
Uniwersytet Śląski, pp. 67-68
Pobrano z https://opus.us.edu.pl / Downloaded from Repository of University of Silesia 2024-10-22

Title: "Genius loci" - and man's hegemonic ambitions

Author: Tadeusz Sławek

Citation style: Sławek Tadeusz. (2010). "Genius loci" - and man's hegemonic ambitions.
W: B. Malska, K. Wojcieszuk (red.), "Genius loci" : mappa della ricerca = mapa badań =
research map" (S. 67-68). Katowice : Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego.
 Genius loci –
and man’s hegemonic ambitions
Pobrano z https://opus.us.edu.pl / Downloaded from Repository of University of Silesia 2024-10-22

Although we live in space, most of us experience only those

fragments which relate immediately to our professional life or
daily occupations. Genius loci is a way of putting our experience of
space together by focusing on its true meaning for our existence.
Looking at a landscape we realize that the radical distinction
between “man­‍‑made” and “natural” has undergone a consider‑
able change. As Mircea Eliade put it, landscape demonstrates that
man has taken possession of time. Today, after centuries of man’s
interference in the natural order, the landscape has become in‑
creasingly a set of man­‍‑made artefacts imposed upon the natural
scene, and the secret of the world’s future seems to consist in his
ability to come to terms with a situation in which man’s power
seems to be hegemonic. Thus, genius loci, represented in ancient
mythologies by nymphs or gods as protectors of a given space,
stands for a wider horizon of reflection upon places, a reflection
not limited to mere geographical description but probing the so‑
cial, political, religious, and cultural significances of a given locus.
It also tries to accommodate and deal with human emotional
involvement in the spatial circumstances of life since as Marjorie
Grene wisely observed, through genius loci we become aware of
 68 Tadeusz Sławek

the fact that our being­‍‑in­‍‑space cannot be conceived of in terms

of mere topography or even epistemology. As she says, our
being­‍‑in­‍‑space is not gnostic but, rather, pathic, which recalls the
Greek pathein, genius loci tries to name and approach a particular
kind of bonding of man with the world which recognizes the
structure of our emotional commitment, a structure which neces‑
sarily includes pain and suffering. Thus, genius loci is a cluster of
phenomena – geographical, political, social and cultural – which
constitute a dense network of relationships that Vidal de la Blache
referred to as chronological.
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Thus there are two fundamental reasons which explain the

urgency of research on the problem of genius loci. First, as a man‑
ner of relating man to the world, genius loci describes a mode
of ordering our individual lives and experiences but also helps
to understand our social, economic and political circumstances.
Secondly, it requires a multidisciplinary approach in order to do
justice to the intricacies of the problem and take into considera‑
tion its international and universal character.
Tadeusz Sławek