Zygmunt Bauman
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Zygmunt Bauman (; ; 19 November 1925 – 9 January 2017) was a Polish–British sociologist and philosopher. He was driven out of the
Polish People's Republic The Polish People's Republic (1952–1989), formerly the Republic of Poland (1947–1952), and also often simply known as Poland, was a country in Central Europe that existed as the predecessor of the modern-day democratic Republic of Poland. ...
during the
1968 Polish political crisis A series of major student, intellectual and other protests against the ruling Polish United Workers' Party of the Polish People's Republic took place in Poland in March 1968. The crisis led to the suppression of student strikes by security forces ...
and forced to give up his
Polish citizenship Polish nationality law is based primarily on the principle of jus sanguinis. Children born to at least one Polish parent acquire Polish citizenship irrespective of place of birth. Besides other things, Polish citizenship entitles the person to ...
. He emigrated to
Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
; three years later he moved to the United Kingdom. He resided in England from 1971, where he studied at the
London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...
and became Professor of Sociology at the
University of Leeds The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Y ...
, later emeritus. Bauman was a social theorist, writing on issues as diverse as
modernity Modernity, a topic in the humanities and social sciences, is both a historical period (the modern era) and the ensemble of particular Society, socio-Culture, cultural Norm (social), norms, attitudes and practices that arose in the wake of the ...
and the
Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
,
postmodern Postmodernism encompasses a variety of artistic, cultural, and philosophical movements that claim to mark a break from modernism. They have in common the conviction that it is no longer possible to rely upon previous ways of depicting the wo ...
consumerism Consumerism is a socio-cultural and economic phenomenon that is typical of industrialized societies. It is characterized by the continuous acquisition of goods and services in ever-increasing quantities. In contemporary consumer society, the ...
and
liquid modernity Liquid is a state of matter with a definite volume but no fixed shape. Liquids adapt to the shape of their container and are nearly incompressible, maintaining their volume even under pressure. The density of a liquid is usually close to that ...
.


Early life and education

Bauman was born to a non-observant
Polish Jewish The history of the Jews in Poland dates back at least 1,000 years. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Jews, Jewish community in the world. Poland was a principal center of Jewish culture, because of the long pe ...
family in
Poznań Poznań ( ) is a city on the Warta, River Warta in west Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business center and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John's ...
,
Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 6 October 1939. The state was established in the final stage of World War I ...
, in 1925. In 1939, when Poland was invaded by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, his family escaped eastwards into the USSR. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, Bauman enlisted in the Soviet-controlled First Polish Army, working as a political instructor. He took part in the
Battle of Kolberg (1945) The Battle of Kolberg or Battle of Kołobrzeg (also, battle for Festung Kolberg) was the taking of the city of ''Kolberg'', now the city of Kołobrzeg, in Pomerania Province (1815-1945), Pomerania by the First Polish Army (1944–1945), Poli ...
and the
Battle of Berlin The Battle of Berlin, designated as the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, and also known as the Fall of Berlin, was one of the last major offensives of the European theatre of World War II. After the Vistula–Od ...
. In May 1945, he was awarded the Military Cross of Valour. After World War II he became one of the
Polish Army The Land Forces () are the Army, land forces of the Polish Armed Forces. They currently contain some 110,000 active personnel and form many components of the European Union and NATO deployments around the world. Poland's recorded military histor ...
's youngest majors.


Career

According to the Polish
Institute of National Remembrance The Institute of National Remembrance – Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation (, abbreviated IPN) is a Polish state research institute in charge of education and archives which also includes two public prosecutio ...
, from 1945 to 1953 Bauman was a political officer in the
Internal Security Corps The Internal Security Corps (, KBW) was a special-purpose military formation in Poland under History of Poland (1945–1989)#Stalinist era (1948–1956), communist government, established on 24 May 1945. History The KBW consisted of 10 new ca ...
(KBW), a military intelligence unit formed to combat the
Ukrainian Insurgent Army The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (, abbreviated UPA) was a Ukrainian nationalist partisan formation founded by the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) on 14 October 1942. The UPA launched guerrilla warfare against Nazi Germany, the S ...
and the remnants of the Polish
Home Army The Home Army (, ; abbreviated AK) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) established in the ...
.Piotr Gontarczyk
''Towarzysz "Semjon". Nieznany życiorys Zygmunta Baumana''
"Biuletyn IPN", 6/2006. S. 74–83
However, the nature and extent of his involvement remain unknown, as well as the exact circumstances under which it was terminated. In an interview with ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'', Bauman confirmed he had been a committed Communist during and after World War II and had never made a secret of it. He admitted that joining the military intelligence service at age 19 was a mistake although he had a "dull" desk job and did not remember informing on anyone. While serving in the Internal Security Corps, Bauman first studied sociology at the Warsaw Academy of Political and Social Science. In 1953, Bauman, already in the rank of major, was suddenly dishonourably discharged, after his father had approached the Israeli embassy in Warsaw with a view to emigrating to
Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
. As Bauman did not share his father's
Zionist Zionism is an Ethnic nationalism, ethnocultural nationalist movement that emerged in History of Europe#From revolution to imperialism (1789–1914), Europe in the late 19th century that aimed to establish and maintain a national home for the ...
tendencies and was indeed strongly
anti-Zionist Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism. Although anti-Zionism is a heterogeneous phenomenon, all its proponents agree that the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, and the movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the Palestine (region) ...
, his dismissal caused a severe, though temporary estrangement from his father. During the period of unemployment that followed, he completed his M.A. and in 1954 became a lecturer at the
University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw (, ) is a public university, public research university in Warsaw, Poland. Established on November 19, 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country, offering 37 different fields of study as well ...
, where he remained until 1968. While at the
London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...
, where his supervisor was Robert McKenzie, he prepared a comprehensive study on the British socialist movement, his first major book. Published originally in Polish in 1959, a revised edition appeared in English in 1972. Bauman went on to publish other books, including ''Socjologia na co dzień'' ("Everyday Sociology", 1964), which reached a large popular audience in Poland and later formed the foundation for the English-language text-book ''Thinking Sociologically'' (1990). Initially, Bauman remained close to orthodox
Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...
doctrine, but, influenced by
Georg Simmel Georg Simmel (; ; 1 March 1858 – 26 September 1918) was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. Simmel was influential in the field of sociology. Simmel was one of the first generation of German sociologists: his neo-Kantian approach ...
and
Antonio Gramsci Antonio Francesco Gramsci ( , ; ; 22 January 1891 – 27 April 1937) was an Italian Marxist philosophy, Marxist philosopher, Linguistics, linguist, journalist, writer, and politician. He wrote on philosophy, Political philosophy, political the ...
, he became increasingly critical of Poland's Communist government. Owing to this he was never awarded a
professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...
ship even after he completed his
habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...
. But after his former teacher, Julian Hochfeld, was made vice-director of
UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
's Department for Social Sciences in Paris in 1962, Bauman did in fact inherit Hochfeld's chair. Faced with increasing political pressure connected with a political purge led by
Mieczysław Moczar Mieczysław Moczar (; birth name Mikołaj Diomko, pseudonym ''Mietek'', 23 December 1913 – 1 November 1986) was a Polish communist politician who played a prominent role in the history of the Polish People's Republic The Polish People's R ...
, the Chief of the Polish Communist Security Police, Bauman renounced his membership of the governing
Polish United Workers' Party The Polish United Workers' Party (, ), commonly abbreviated to PZPR, was the communist party which ruled the Polish People's Republic as a one-party state from 1948 to 1989. The PZPR had led two other legally permitted subordinate minor parti ...
in January 1968. The
1968 Polish political crisis A series of major student, intellectual and other protests against the ruling Polish United Workers' Party of the Polish People's Republic took place in Poland in March 1968. The crisis led to the suppression of student strikes by security forces ...
culminated in a purge that drove many remaining Communist Poles of Jewish descent out of the country, including those intellectuals who had fallen from grace with the Communist government. Bauman, who had lost his chair at the University of Warsaw, was among them. He had to give up Polish citizenship to be allowed to leave the country. In 1968, he went to Israel to teach at
Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
. In 1970, he moved to
Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...
, where he accepted the chair of sociology at the
University of Leeds The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Y ...
. There he intermittently also served as head of the department. After his appointment, he published almost exclusively in English, his third language, and his reputation grew. From the late 1990s, Bauman exerted a considerable influence on the
anti- Anti- is an American record label founded in 1999 as a sister label to Epitaph Records. Founded by Andy Kaulkin, Anti- first gained attention by releasing Tom Waits's Grammy Award–winning '' Mule Variations'' in 1999. Other veteran recordin ...
or
alter-globalisation Alter-globalization (also known as alter-globo, alternative globalization or alter-mundialization—from the French alter- mondialisation) is a social movement whose proponents support global cooperation and interaction, but oppose what they desc ...
movement. In a 2011 interview in the Polish weekly '' Polityka'', Bauman criticised Zionism and Israel, saying Israel was not interested in peace and that it was "taking advantage of the Holocaust to legitimize unconscionable acts". He expressed that "the mission of the Holocaust survivors is to bring salvation to the world and to protect it from another catastrophe: to expose hidden but still vital evil tendencies in this world, in order to prevent a second disgrace to civilization." In this specific context, he compared the
Israeli West Bank barrier The West Bank barrier, West Bank wall or the West Bank separation barrier, is a separation barrier built by Israel along the Green Line (Israel), Green Line and inside parts of the West Bank. Israel describes the wall as a necessary securi ...
to the walls of the
Warsaw Ghetto The Warsaw Ghetto (, officially , ; ) was the largest of the Nazi ghettos during World War II and the Holocaust. It was established in November 1940 by the Nazi Germany, German authorities within the new General Government territory of Occupat ...
, where thousands of Jews died in the Holocaust, but to emphasize that "inflicting suffering degrades and morally destroys those who inflict suffering – and, contrary to belief, does not ennoble the suffering in the least." The Israeli ambassador to Poland, Zvi Bar, called Bauman's comments "half truths" and "groundless generalizations."
Janina Bauman Janina Bauman ( Lewinson; 18 August 1926, in Warsaw – 29 December 2009, in Leeds) was a Polish journalist and writer of Jewish origin. Biography She was the daughter of Szymon Lewinson (1896–1940), a Urology, urologist and Polish Army off ...
, the wife of Bauman, along with her sister Sophie and her mother Alina survived the slaughter of the Jews of Warsaw and the crushing of the Warsaw ghetto. In 2013 Bauman made his first visit to Israel after he left it in 1970: he accepted an invitation offered by the Israeli Sociological Society to give a keynote lecture at the ISS Annual Meeting and conduct a seminar with Israeli PhD sociology students. Bauman was a supporter of the Campaign for the Establishment of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly, an organisation which advocates for democratic reform in the United Nations, and the creation of a more accountable international political system.


Personal life and death

Bauman was married to writer
Janina Bauman Janina Bauman ( Lewinson; 18 August 1926, in Warsaw – 29 December 2009, in Leeds) was a Polish journalist and writer of Jewish origin. Biography She was the daughter of Szymon Lewinson (1896–1940), a Urology, urologist and Polish Army off ...
, née Lewinson; 18 August 1926 – 29 December 2009. They had three daughters, painter Lydia Bauman, architect Irena Bauman, and professor Anna Sfard, a leading theorist of education at the University of Haifa. His grandson Michael Sfard is a prominent civil rights activist and author in Israel. After losing his first wife, in 2015 he married sociologist Aleksandra Jasińska-Kania. She survived him upon his death in 2017. Zygmunt Bauman died in Leeds on 9 January 2017.


Work

Bauman's published work extends to 57 books and well over a hundred articles. Most of these address a number of common themes, among which are
globalisation Globalization is the process of increasing interdependence and integration among the economies, markets, societies, and cultures of different countries worldwide. This is made possible by the reduction of barriers to international trade, th ...
,
modernity Modernity, a topic in the humanities and social sciences, is both a historical period (the modern era) and the ensemble of particular Society, socio-Culture, cultural Norm (social), norms, attitudes and practices that arose in the wake of the ...
and
postmodernity Postmodernity (post-modernity or the postmodern condition) is the economic or cultural state or condition of society which is said to exist ''after'' modernity. Some schools of thought hold that modernity ended in the late 20th century – in th ...
,
consumerism Consumerism is a socio-cultural and economic phenomenon that is typical of industrialized societies. It is characterized by the continuous acquisition of goods and services in ever-increasing quantities. In contemporary consumer society, the ...
, and
morality Morality () is the categorization of intentions, Decision-making, decisions and Social actions, actions into those that are ''proper'', or ''right'', and those that are ''improper'', or ''wrong''. Morality can be a body of standards or principle ...
.


Early work

Bauman's earliest publication in English is a study of the British
labour movement The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considere ...
and its relationship to class and
social stratification Social stratification refers to a society's categorization of its people into groups based on socioeconomic factors like wealth, income, race, education, ethnicity, gender, occupation, social status, or derived power (social and political ...
, originally published in Poland in 1960. He continued to publish on the subject of class and social conflict until the early 1980s. His last book was on the subject of ''Memories of Class''. Whilst his later books do not address issues of class directly, he continued to describe himself as a
socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...
, and he never rejected
Marxism Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, ...
entirely. The
neo-Marxist Neo-Marxism is a collection of Marxist schools of thought originating from 20th-century approaches to amend or extend Marxism and Marxist theory, typically by incorporating elements from other intellectual traditions such as critical theory, ps ...
theorist
Antonio Gramsci Antonio Francesco Gramsci ( , ; ; 22 January 1891 – 27 April 1937) was an Italian Marxist philosophy, Marxist philosopher, Linguistics, linguist, journalist, writer, and politician. He wrote on philosophy, Political philosophy, political the ...
in particular remained one of his most profound influences, along with
Neo-Kantian In late modern philosophy, neo-Kantianism () was a revival of the 18th-century philosophy of Immanuel Kant. The neo-Kantians sought to develop and clarify Kant's theories, particularly his concept of the thing-in-itself and his moral philosophy ...
sociologist and
philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
Georg Simmel Georg Simmel (; ; 1 March 1858 – 26 September 1918) was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. Simmel was influential in the field of sociology. Simmel was one of the first generation of German sociologists: his neo-Kantian approach ...
.


Modernity and rationality

In the late 1980s and early 1990s Bauman published a number of books that dealt with the relationship between modernity, bureaucracy, rationality and social exclusion. Bauman, following
Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies seen as originating fro ...
, came to view European modernity as a trade off: European society, he argued, had agreed to forego a level of freedom to receive the benefits of increased individual security. Bauman argued that modernity, in what he later came to term its 'solid' form, involved removing unknowns and uncertainties. It involved control over nature, hierarchical bureaucracy, rules and regulations, control and categorisation — all of which attempted to gradually remove personal insecurities, making the chaotic aspects of human life appear well-ordered and familiar. Later in a number of books Bauman began to develop the position that such order-making never manages to achieve the desired results. When life becomes organised into familiar and manageable categories, he argued, there are always social groups who cannot be administered, who cannot be separated out and controlled. In his book ''Modernity and Ambivalence'' Bauman began to theorise about such indeterminate persons in terms of an allegorical figure he called, 'the stranger.' Drawing upon Georg Simmel's sociology and the philosophy of
Jacques Derrida Jacques Derrida (; ; born Jackie Élie Derrida;Peeters (2013), pp. 12–13. See also 15 July 1930 – 9 October 2004) was a French Algerian philosopher. He developed the philosophy of deconstruction, which he utilized in a number of his texts, ...
, Bauman came to write of the stranger as the person who is present yet unfamiliar, society's ''undecidable''. In ''Modernity and Ambivalence'' Bauman attempted to give an account of the different approaches modern society adopts toward the stranger. He argued that, on the one hand, in a consumer-oriented economy the strange and the unfamiliar is always enticing; in different styles of food, different fashions and in tourism it is possible to experience the allure of what is unfamiliar. Yet this strange-ness also has a more negative side. The stranger, because he cannot be controlled or ordered, is always the object of fear; he is the potential mugger, the person outside of society's borders who is a constant threat. One of Bauman's most famous books, '' Modernity and the Holocaust'', is an attempt to give a full account of the dangers of those kinds of fears. Drawing upon
Hannah Arendt Hannah Arendt (born Johanna Arendt; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a German and American historian and philosopher. She was one of the most influential political theory, political theorists of the twentieth century. Her work ...
and
Theodor W. Adorno Theodor W. Adorno ( ; ; born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund; 11 September 1903 – 6 August 1969) was a German philosopher, musicologist, and social theorist. He was a leading member of the Frankfurt School of critical theory, whose work has com ...
's books on totalitarianism and the Enlightenment, Bauman developed the argument that the Holocaust should not simply be considered to be an event in Jewish history, nor a regression to pre-modern barbarism. Rather, he argued, the Holocaust should be seen as deeply connected to modernity and its order-making efforts. Procedural rationality, the division of labour into smaller and smaller tasks, the taxonomic categorisation of different species, and the tendency to view obedience to rules as morally good, all played their role in the Holocaust coming to pass. He argued that for this reason modern societies have not fully grasped the lessons of the Holocaust; it tends to be viewed—to use Bauman's metaphor—like a picture hanging on the wall, offering few lessons. In Bauman's analysis the Jews became 'strangers' ''par excellence'' in Europe. The
Final Solution The Final Solution or the Final Solution to the Jewish Question was a plan orchestrated by Nazi Germany during World War II for the genocide of individuals they defined as Jews. The "Final Solution to the Jewish question" was the official ...
was pictured by him as an extreme example of the attempt made by society to excise the uncomfortable and indeterminate elements that exist within it. Bauman, like the philosopher
Giorgio Agamben Giorgio Agamben ( ; ; born 22 April 1942) is an Italian philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception, form-of-life (borrowed from Ludwig Wittgenstein) and '' homo sacer''. The concept of biopolitic ...
, contended that the same processes of exclusion that were at work in the Holocaust could, and to an extent do, still come into play today.


Postmodernity and consumerism

In the mid-to-late 1990s, Bauman began to explore ''postmodernity'' and ''consumerism''. He posited that a shift had taken place in modern society in the latter half of the 20th century. It had changed from a society of producers into a society of consumers. According to Bauman, this change reversed Freud's "modern" tradeoff—i.e., security was given up in exchange for more freedom, freedom to purchase, consume, and enjoy life. In his books in the 1990s Bauman wrote of this as being a shift from "modernity" to "post-modernity". Since the turn of the millennium, his books have tried to avoid the confusion surrounding the term "postmodernity" by using the metaphors of "liquid" and "solid" modernity. In his books on modern consumerism, Bauman still writes of the same uncertainties that he portrayed in his writings on "solid" modernity; but in these books he writes of fears becoming more diffuse and harder to pin down. Indeed, they are, to use the title of one of his books, "liquid fears" – fears about
paedophilia Pedophilia ( alternatively spelled paedophilia) is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Although girls typically begin the process of pube ...
, for instance, which are amorphous and have no easily identifiable reference. Bauman is credited with coining the term " allosemitism" to encompass both philo-Semitic and
anti-Semitic Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...
attitudes towards Jews as the other. Bauman reportedly predicted the negative political effect that social media have on voter's choice by denouncing them as 'trap' where people only "see reflections of their own face".


Art: a liquid element?

One of Bauman works focuses on the concept of art as influenced by the liquidity of appreciation. The author puts forward the idea that "we desire and seek a realization that usually consists of a constant ''becoming'', in a permanent disposition of ''becoming''". In essence, our aim is not the object of our longing but the action of longing itself, and the worst peril is reaching complete satisfaction. In this framework, Bauman explores how art can position itself in a world where the fleeting is the dominant paradigm. Art is substantially something that contributes to giving immortality to virtually anything: hence the philosopher wonders, "can art transform the ephemeral into an eternal matter?". Bauman concludes that the current reality is characterized by individuals who do not have time nor space to relate with the everlasting, with absolute and established values. Art and the relation of people with them, both in creating it and in participating in it, is dramatically changing. Citing
Hannah Arendt Hannah Arendt (born Johanna Arendt; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a German and American historian and philosopher. She was one of the most influential political theory, political theorists of the twentieth century. Her work ...
, he asserts that "an object is cultural if it persists; its temporary aspect, its permanence, is opposite to the functional ..culture sees itself threatened when all the objects in the world, those produced today and those of the past, are exclusively considered from the point of view of utility for the social process of survival". Withal, the concept of culture and art can only find a sense in the liquid society if it abandons its traditional understanding and adopts the deconstructive approach. Bauman gives as examples artworks by Manolo Valdés, Jacques Villeglé and
Herman Braun-Vega Herman Braun-Vega (7 July 1933 in Lima — 2 April 2019 in Paris) was a Peruvian painter and artist. Although his work has always been figurative, it was at first (before 1970) close to abstraction. It experienced a decisive turning point when t ...
.


Awards and honours

Bauman was awarded the European Amalfi Prize for Sociology and Social Sciences in 1992, the Theodor W. Adorno Award of the city of
Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
in 1998 and The VIZE 97 Prize in 2006. He was awarded in 2010, jointly with Alain Touraine, the Princess of Asturias Award for Communication and the Humanities. The University of Leeds established 'The Bauman Institute' within its School of Sociology and Social Policy in his honour in September 2010. The University of Lower Silesia, a small private higher education institution in Lower Silesia,
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
, planned to award Bauman an honorary doctorate in October 2013. However, as a response to a "several antisemitic attacks via social media internet sites""Leeds professor rejects Polish award over antisemitic slurs"
, ''
The Jewish Chronicle ''The Jewish Chronicle'' (''The JC'') is a London-based Jewish weekly newspaper. Founded in 1841, it is the oldest continuously published Jewish newspaper in the world. Its editor () is Daniel Schwammenthal. The newspaper is published every Fri ...
''. Retrieved 9 January 2017.
mixed with accusations of having a pro-socialist background against him by far-right groups, he eventually declined the doctorate. In 2015 the University of Salento awarded Bauman an honorary degree in Modern Languages, Literature and Literary Translation.


Dismissal of plagiarism allegations

In 2014, Peter Walsh, a PhD candidate at the
University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...
, accused Bauman of plagiarism from several websites, including Wikipedia, in his book ''Does the Richness of the Few Benefit Us All?'' (2013). In this book Bauman is said to have copied verbatim paragraphs from Wikipedia articles on Slow Food and
steady-state economy A steady-state economy is an economy made up of a constant stock of physical wealth (capital) and a constant population size. In effect, such an economy does not grow in the course of time. The term usually refers to the economy, national eco ...
, along with their bibliography, without attributing sources, authors or the fact that they were copied from Wikipedia. He did use a paragraph from the article on the
golden handshake A golden handshake is a clause in an executive employment contract that provides the executive with a significant severance package in the case that the executive loses their job through firing, restructuring, or even scheduled retirement. Thi ...
, but this citation was properly attributed to Wikipedia. In a response, Bauman suggested that "obedience" to "technical" rules was unnecessary, and that he "never once failed to acknowledge the authorship of the ideas or concepts that I deployed, or that inspired the ones I coined". In a detailed critique of Walsh and co-author David Lehmann, cultural critics
Brad Evans Brad Evans may refer to: * Brad Evans (soccer) (born 1985), American soccer player * Brad Evans (author) (born 1974), political philosopher, critical theorist and writer * Brad Evans (cricketer) (born 1997), Zimbabwean cricketer * Brad Evans (cy ...
and
Henry Giroux Henry Armand Giroux (born September 19, 1943) is an American and Canadian scholar and cultural critic. One of the founding theorists of critical pedagogy in the United States, he is best known for his pioneering work in public pedagogy, cultural ...
concluded: "This charge against Bauman is truly despicable. It's a reactionary ideological critique dressed up as the celebration of method and a back-door defence of sterile empiricism and culture of positivism. This is a discourse that enshrines data, correlations, and performance, while eschewing matters of substance, social problems, and power."


Bibliography


Warsaw period

* 1957: ''Zagadnienia centralizmu demokratycznego w pracach Lenina'' uestions of Democratic Centralism in Lenin's Works Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza. * 1959: ''Socjalizm brytyjski: Źródła, filozofia, doktryna polityczna'' ritish Socialism: Sources, Philosophy, Political Doctrine Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. * 1960: ''Klasa, ruch, elita: Studium socjologiczne dziejów angielskiego ruchu robotniczego'' lass, Movement, Elite: A Sociological Study on the History of the British Labour Movement Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. * 1960: ''Z dziejów demokratycznego ideału'' rom the History of the Democratic Ideal Warszawa: Iskry. * 1960: ''Kariera: cztery szkice socjologiczne'' areer: Four Sociological Sketches Warszawa: Iskry. * 1961: ''Z zagadnień współczesnej socjologii amerykańskiej'' uestions of Modern American Sociology Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza. * 1962 (with Szymon Chodak, Juliusz Strojnowski, Jakub Banaszkiewicz): ''Systemy partyjne współczesnego kapitalizmu'' he Party Systems of Modern Capitalism Warsaw: Książka i Wiedza. * 1962: ''Spoleczeństwo, w ktorym żyjemy'' he Society we inhabit Warsaw: Książka i Wiedza. * 1962: ''Zarys socjologii. Zagadnienia i pojęcia'' utline of Sociology. Questions and Concepts Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. * 1963: ''Idee, ideały, ideologie'' deas, Ideals, Ideologies Warszawa: Iskry. * 1964: ''Zarys marksistowskiej teorii spoleczeństwa'' An Outline of the Marxist Theory of Society Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. * 1964: ''Socjologia na co dzień'' veryday Sociology Warszawa: Iskry. * 1965: ''Wizje ludzkiego świata. Studia nad społeczną genezą i funkcją socjologii'' isions of a Human World: Studies on the genesis of society and the function of sociology Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza. * 1966: ''Kultura i społeczeństwo. Preliminaria'' ulture and Society, Preliminaries Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. * 2017: ''Szkice z teorii kultury'' ssays in cultural theory Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Scholar. irst edition of a manuscript originally completed in 1967


Leeds period

* 1972: ''Between Class and Elite. The Evolution of the British Labour Movement. A Sociological Study''. Manchester: Manchester University Press (Polish original 1960) * 1973: ''Culture as Praxis.'' London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. * 1976: ''Socialism: The Active Utopia''. New York: Holmes and Meier Publishers. * 1976: ''Towards a Critical Sociology: An Essay on Common-Sense and Emancipation''. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. * 1978: ''Hermeneutics and Social Science: Approaches to Understanding''. London: Hutchinson. * 1982: ''Memories of Class: The Pre-History and After-Life of Class''. London/Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul. * c. 1985 ''Stalin and the Peasant Revolution: A Case Study in the Dialectics of Master and Slave''. Leeds: University of Leeds Department of Sociology. * 1987: ''Legislators and Interpreters: On Modernity, Post-Modernity, Intellectuals''. Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University, an Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. It is currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, maki ...
. * 1988: ''Freedom''. Philadelphia: Open University Press. * 1989: ''Modernity and the Holocaust''. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1989. * 1990: ''Paradoxes of Assimilation''. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers. * 1990: ''Thinking Sociologically. An Introduction for Everyone''. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell. * 1991: ''Modernity and Ambivalence''. Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University, an Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. It is currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, maki ...
. * 1992: ''Intimations of Postmodernity''. London, New York: Routhledge. * 1992: ''Mortality, Immortality and Other Life Strategies''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 1993: ''Postmodern Ethics.'' Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell. * 1994: ''Dwa szkice o moralności ponowoczesnej'' wo sketches on postmodern morality Warszawa: IK. * 1995: ''Life in Fragments. Essays in Postmodern Morality''. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell. * 1996: ''Alone Again – Ethics After Certainty.'' London: Demos. * 1997: '' Postmodernity and Its Discontents''. New York:
New York University Press New York University Press (or NYU Press) is a university press that is part of New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 ...
. * 1995: ''Ciało i przemoc w obliczu ponowoczesności'' ody and Violence in the Face of Postmodernity Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika. * 1997 (with Roman Kubicki, Anna Zeidler-Janiszewska): ''Humanista w ponowoczesnym świecie – rozmowy o sztuce życia, nauce, życiu sztuki i innych sprawach'' Humanist in the Postmodern World – Conversations on the Art of Life, Science, the Life of Art and Other Matters Warszawa: Zysk i S-ka. * 1998: ''Work, Consumerism and the New Poor''. Philadelphia:
Open University Press McGraw Hill is an American education science company that provides educational content, software, and services for students and educators across various levels—from K-12 to higher education and professional settings. They produce textbooks, ...
. * 1998: ''Globalization: The Human Consequences''. New York:
Columbia University Press Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's la ...
. * 1999: ''In Search of Politics''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2000: ''Liquid Modernity''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
* 2000 ( Peter Beilharz ed.): ''The Bauman Reader''. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. ) * 2001: ''Community. Seeking Safety in an Insecure World''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2001: ''The Individualized Society.'' Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2001 (with Keith Tester): ''Conversations with Zygmunt Bauman''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2001 (with Tim May): ''Thinking Sociologically'', 2nd ed. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. * 2002: ''Society Under Siege.'' Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2003: '' Liquid Love: On the Frailty of Human Bonds'', Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2003: ''City of Fears, City of Hopes''. London: Goldsmiths College. * 2004: ''Wasted Lives. Modernity and its Outcasts.'' Cambridge: Polity. * 2004: ''Europe: An Unfinished Adventure''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2004: ''Identity: Conversations with Benedetto Vecchi''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2005: ''Liquid Life''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2006: ''Liquid Fear''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2006: ''Liquid Times: Living in an Age of Uncertainty''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
. * 2006: ''Moralność w niestabilnym świecie'' orality in an instable World Poznań: Księgarnia św. Wojciecha. * 2007: ''Consuming Life''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2008: ''Does Ethics Have a Chance in a World of Consumers?'' Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...
. * 2008: ''The Art of Life''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2009: ''Living on Borrowed Time: Conversations with Citlali Rovirosa-Madrazo''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2009: (with Roman Kubicki, Anna Zeidler-Janiszewska) ''Życie w kontekstach. Rozmowy o tym, co za nami i o tym, co przed nami.'' ife in contexts. Conversations about what lies behind us and what lies ahead of us.Warszawa: WAiP. * 2010: ''44 Letters from the Liquid Modern World''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2011: ''Collateral Damage: Social Inequalities in a Global Age''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2011: ''Culture in a Liquid Modern World''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2012: ''This is Not a Diary''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2012: (with David Lyon) ''Liquid Surveillance: A Conversation''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2013 (with Leonidas Donskis): ''Moral Blindness: The Loss of Sensitivity in Liquid Modernity.'' Cambridge: Polity. * 2013 (with Stanisław Obirek): ''O bogu i człowieku. Rozmowy''. Kraków: Wydawnictwo Literackie. ** translated as ''Of God and Man''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2013 (with Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester): ''What use is sociology? Conversations with Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2013: ''Does the Richness of the Few Benefit Us All?'' Cambridge: Polity. * 2014: (with Carlo Bordoni) ''State of Crisis''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2015: (with
Rein Raud Rein Raud (born 21 December 1961) is an Estonian academic and author. Early life He was born in 1961 in the family of Eno Raud and Aino Pervik, both children's authors. He is the eldest of three children. His younger brother Mihkel Raud is ...
) ''Practices of Selfhood''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2015: (with Irena Bauman, Jerzy Kociatkiewicz, and Monika Kostera) ''Management in a Liquid Modern World''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2015: (with Stanisław Obirek) ''Of God and Man,'' Cambridge: Polity Press.. * 2015: (with Stanisław Obirek) ''On the World and Ourselves'', Cambridge: Polity. . * 2016: (with Leonidas Donskis) ''Liquid Evil''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2016: (with
Ezio Mauro Ezio Mauro (born 24 October 1948) is an Italian journalist. He was editor-in-chief of the newspaper ''la Repubblica'' from 1996 to 2016. Biography Mauro was born in Dronero, in the province of Cuneo. He started his career as a journalist, writ ...
) ''Babel''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2016: ''Strangers at Our Door''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2017: ''Retrotopia''. Cambridge: Polity. * 2017: (with Thomas Leoncini) ''Nati Liquidi''. Sperling & Kupfler. * 2017: ''Zygmunt Bauman. Das Vertraute unvertraut machen''. Ein Gespräch mit Peter Haffner, Hoffmann und Campe, Hamburg 2017, * 2017: ''A Chronicle of Crisis: 2011–2016''. Social Europe Editions.


See also

*
Leszek Kołakowski Leszek Kołakowski (; ; 23 October 1927 – 17 July 2009) was a Polish philosopher and historian of ideas. He is best known for his critical analysis of Marxism, Marxist thought, as in his three-volume history of Marxist philosophy ''Main Current ...


References


Further reading

* 1995: Richard Kilminster, Ian Varcoe (eds.), ''Culture, Modernity and Revolution: Essays in Honour of Zygmunt Bauman.'' London: Routledge; * 2000: Peter Beilharz, ''Zygmunt Bauman: Dialectic of Modernity''. London: Sage; * 2000: Dennis Smith, ''Zygmunt Bauman: Prophet of Postmodernity (Key Contemporary Thinkers)''. Cambridge:
Polity A polity is a group of people with a collective identity, who are organized by some form of political Institutionalisation, institutionalized social relations, and have a capacity to mobilize resources. A polity can be any group of people org ...
; * 2004: Keith Tester, ''The Social Thought of Zygmunt Bauman''. Palgrave MacMillan; * 2005: Tony Blackshaw, ''Zygmunt Bauman (Key Sociologists)''. London/New York: Routledge; * 2006: Keith Tester, Michael Hviid Jacobsen, ''Bauman Before Postmodernity: Invitation, Conversations and Annotated Bibliography 1953–1989''. Aalborg: Aalborg University Press; * 2007: Keith Tester, Michael Hviid Jacobsen, Sophia Marshman, ''Bauman Beyond Postmodernity: Conversations, Critiques and Annotated Bibliography 1989–2005''. Aalborg: Aalborg University Press; * 2007: Anthony Elliott (ed.), ''The Contemporary Bauman''. London: Routledge; * 2008: Michael Hviid Jacobsen, Poul Poder (eds.), ''The Sociology of Zygmunt Bauman: Challenges and Critique''. London: Ashgate; . * 2008: Mark Davis, ''Freedom and Consumerism: A Critique of Zygmunt Bauman's Sociology''. Aldershot: Ashgate; . * 2010: Mark Davis, Keith Tester (eds), ''Bauman's Challenge: Sociological Issues for the 21st Century''. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan; * 2013: Pierre-Antoine Chardel, ''Zygmunt Bauman. Les illusions perdues de la modernité''. Paris: CNRS Editions; * 2013: Shaun Best, ''Zygmunt Bauman: Why Good People Do Bad Things''. Farnham: Ashgate; * 2013: Mark Davis (ed.), ''Liquid Sociology: Metaphor in Zygmunt Bauman's Analysis of Modernity.'' Farnham: Ashgate; * 2013: Paulo Fernando da Silva,
Conceito de ética na contemporaneidade segundo Bauman
''. São Paulo: Cultura Acadêmica; * 2016: Michael Hviid Jacobsen (Ed), "Beyond Bauman: Critical Engagements and Creative Excursions"? London: Routledge; (hardback); 978-1-315-56917-8 (ebook) * 2016: Tony Blackshaw (Ed)," The New Bauman Reader: Thinking Sociologically in Liquid Modern Times", Manchester: Manchester University Press; (hardback); 978-1-7849-9403-7 (paperback) * 2016: Carlo Bordoni (Ed), "Zygmunt Bauman. With an original contribution", in ''Revue Internationale de Philosophie'', n. 3, vol. 70, * 2017: Ali Rattansi, "Bauman and Contemporary Sociology: A Critical Analysis", Manchester: Manchester University Press (in press, to be published Spring 2017). * 2017: Sociedade, Linguagem e Modernidade Líquida. Interview By Leo Peruzzo; in Journal Diálogo Educacional, n. 6, vol. 47. * 2020: Shaun Best, Zygmunt Bauman on Education in Liquid Modernity, London, Routledge, * 2020: Shaun Best, The Emerald Guide to Zygmunt Bauman (Emerald Guides to Social Thought), Bingley, Emerald Publishing Limited * 2020: Izabela Wagner, ''Bauman: A Biography''. Cambridge: Polity; * 2020:
Sheila Fitzpatrick Sheila Mary Fitzpatrick (born June 4, 1941) is an Australian historian, whose main subjects are history of the Soviet Union and history of modern Russia, especially the Stalin era and the Great Purges, of which she proposes a " history from b ...
, "Whatever Made Him" (review of Izabela Wagner, ''Bauman: A Biography'', Polity, June 2020, , 510 pp.), ''
London Review of Books The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published bimonthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review of Book ...
'', vol. 42, no. 17 (10 September 2020), pp. 9–11. " his biography'sleitmotif is the dichotomy between Bauman's Polish and Jewish identities, the first being the one he chose, the second the one fixed on him by others, in particular other Poles. . 9. r all the difficulties and uprootings of his life, he not only stubbornly refused the role of victim but also managed to achieve the rare status – rare at least in interesting biographies – of being a happy man." (p. 11.) * 2022: Dariusz Brzeziński, ''Zygmunt Bauman and the Theory of Culture'', Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.


External links


Sociologist Zygmunt Bauman dies
hotrecentnews.com
Inhumanity is part of human nature
salon.eu.sk
Free full-text download of ''Alone Again – Ethics After Certainty'' (1996) from the official publisher Demos (PDF)

"The Global Factory of Wasted Humans" – filmed conference of Z. Bauman (2003)
archivesaudiovisuelles.fr
Bauman interview (2011)
vimeo.com
Video: The Ambiance of Uncertainty – Interview on Reset – Dialogues on Civilizations
resetdoc.org
Zygmunt Bauman: Behind the World's 'crisis of humanity'
YouTube.com (23 July 2016) {{DEFAULTSORT:Bauman, Zygmunt 1925 births 2017 deaths 20th-century Polish philosophers 21st-century Polish philosophers Academics of the University of Leeds Alumni of the London School of Economics Anti-consumerists British people of Polish-Jewish descent Continental philosophers British critics of postmodernism Historians of Nazism British historians of the Holocaust Jewish philosophers Jewish sociologists Modernity Military personnel from Poznań Polish emigrants to the United Kingdom Polish military personnel of World War II Polish People's Army personnel Polish sociologists Polish United Workers' Party members Polish Workers' Party politicians Postmodern writers Recipients of the Cross of Valour (Poland) Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis University of Warsaw alumni Academic staff of the University of Warsaw Writers about globalization Polish agnostics Recipients of the Medal of the 10th Anniversary of the People's Republic of Poland