Totul poate fi remixat: combinatorica textelor theory-fiction
Mihai Țapu
Descriere autor:
Babeș-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca
E-mail:
E-mail personal autor:
mihai.tapu@ubbcluj.ro
3
Rubrica:
Studii literare
Everything Can Be Remixed: The Combinatorics of Theory-fiction Texts
Abstract: This article explores the conceptual, thematic, and stylistic specificities of theory-fiction, a genre prominent in the 1990s that blends fiction with theory and philosophy to challenge traditional textual taxonomies. Focusing on the works of the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit (CCRU), a group of renegade academics from Warwick, the analysis highlights four key cultural influences: post-structuralist critiques of representation (Deleuze, Lyotard), cybernetics, William S. Burroughs’ cut-up technique, and jungle music. The article examines how these elements converge in theory-fiction to destabilize conventional narratives and create hybrid texts that resist categorization. Through a close reading of Nick Land’s works and CCRU’s collective writings, the article identifies recurring themes such as non-linear temporality, anti-humanism, and the critique of Kantian subjectivity. The final section contextualizes theory-fiction within the socio-cultural landscape of 1990s Britain, linking its emergence to the neoliberal academic environment and the broader ideological climate marked by Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history” thesis. Ultimately, this article argues that theory-fiction represents an attempt to disrupt the status quo and imagine alternatives to capitalist realism, blending experimental techniques with interdisciplinary conceptual frameworks.
Keywords: theory-fiction, CCRU, Nick Land, representation, cybernetics, jungle music, William S. Burroughs
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