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POZYTYWIZM: MIĘDZY NOWOCZESNOŚCIĄ A MODERNIZMEM 19

POSITIVISM: BETWEEN MODERNITY AND MODERNISM

Positivism is an epoch and a cultural phenomenon vastly important to understand the socio--cultural modernity and the origin ofPolish artistic modemism. Positivist thinking is involved into Enlightenment dialectics - a socio-psychological mechanism described by M. llorkheimer and Th. W. Adomo in their Dialectics of Enlightenment (Dialektik der Aufkldrang, 1947). This mechanism, penetrating the modern mentality, leads to the formation of artistic modemism in Europę. The dialectics ofPolish positivism (variously treated by Teodor Jeske-Choiński, Zygmunt Szweykowski, and Henryk Markiewicz), analogous to dialectics of Enlightenment. leads to instrumental trealmenl of reason. reification of a man. and wasting of all sense. Tlius. modemism constitute different artistic and ideological reactions to the crisis of positivist rationalism. such as decadence, worship of art. symbolism, utopia, interest in primitive cultures. nationalism. conservatism. The reactions in ąuestion appear also in writing and in the thought of the representatives ofPolish positivism.