Meaninglessness Of Life Research Articles

20-րդ դարի մոդեռնիստական և պոստմոդեռնիստական գրականության էկզիստենցիալ մեկնաբանությունները

The modernist individual is seen as a Creator, shaping their own existence through actions and perceptions, facing the following dilemma of Western thought: despite the absurdity and meaninglessness of life, humans possess unfettered freedom to act. Everything is meaningless, but through the prism of death, a new creation begins, marked by the humanistic courage to act and create in meaninglessness. As Voltaire said: “If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him. Religion is secondary but necessary: people need guidance.” The model of original sin in the light of modernism is transformed into an “accepted, reconciled” model of thinking, where action loses its significance. This aligns with the general characteristics of characters in modernist literature, for the character here is a movement of thought, therefore the sin they commit is also simply a movement of thought. At the same time, the symbol of the "Tree of Knowledge" is an attempt to combine the symbolism of Frazer's "Golden Bough" and the "Tree of Life", which blurs the boundaries between past and present, accomplished and unfinished, showing the paradox of a modern character who is everywhere and nowhere, and their very existence, depends on the acknowledgment of sin.

철학상담으로서 실천가능한 철학교육 모든 가치의 전도

The true value of philosophy is that philosophy should not only pursue theoretical truth but should also play a role in participating in and helping with the pain of life. Therefore, the practical possibilities of philosophy can be found in philosophical counseling. In his early The Birth of Tragedy(1876), Nietzsche recovered ‘Heiterkeit’through Greek tragedy that touches the essence of life, and in Thus Spoke Zarathustra(1883-5), he explored the truth or gained freedom. It shows how to reach Übermensch,’an existential human being who creates new values, through the three stages of mental change that a person must go through. For Nietzsche, the ‘Übermensch’ is a person who finds and achieves meaning in a meaningless life, is an educator who is an example of humanity's self-overcoming and is a new human image that shows the practicability of liberal education. In the Western philosophy world, since the 1980s, a new movement has emerged under the names of Philosophische Praxis and Philosophical Counseling by Gerd B. Achenbach, Germany, to overcome the practical difficulties of philosophy. Nietzsche’s ‘conversion of all values’can show the practical possibility of philosophical education leading to philosophical counseling. The ideal and goal of Nietzsche's philosophy was true education to achieve self-liberation as a human being who educates himself. Now, we would like to look at the core values of Nietzsche's education, which overcomes God and realizes the value as a liberator, in relation to philosophical counseling that helps each human being understand and act in life.

Exploring the ‘Everyday’ in Colin Wilson’s The Black Room and The Personality Surgeon: A Phenomenological Perspective

The English existentialist writer Colin Wilson explores different dimensions of human consciousness in his fictional works to understand the nature of consciousness. Wilson professes the doctrine of “affirmation” and contends that beneath the surface of everyday triviality, which generates pessimistic nihilism and ennui, there is an ever-refreshing reality to which every individual must get access so as to bring value and purpose to life. Hebelieves that this triviality is a result of the narrowness of consciousness. In this state, we take life for granted, and instead of living, we drift. This state resembles how Husserl describes consciousness in its ‘natural attitude’ —a state which is characterised by inattention and unreflectiveness. In this state, one fails to comprehend the experience at hand, thereby losing its meaning and essence. The recognition of this naïve attitude is one of the basic tenets of Wilson’s philosophy. Both Husserl and Wilson show a deep concern with the perception and the perceiver and their fate in all modes of consciousness, which are inextricably linked to human will and imagination and crucial to the evolution of consciousness. Wilson, like Husserl, rose against cultural pessimism engendered by earlier philosophies and envisaged phenomenology as a potent tool to overcome this failure and crisis. Both believe in the spiritual power of phenomenology, which provides new insights into human subjectivity and its sense of bestowing achievements. Wilson’s phenomenological pursuit is anendeavour to solve the existential meaninglessness of life. With a focus on the question of what makes up human values, Wilson’s new existentialism entails a phenomenological analysis of consciousness. His phenomenology of life devaluation is the most relevant area of study because moods of insight and optimism are less accessible than moods of everyday consciousness. Like Husserlian phenomenology, Wilson’s new existentialism lays bare the different layers of human consciousness. In his The New Existentialism,he avers that the ‘new existentialist’ “accepts man’s experience of his inner freedom as basic and irreducible” and ‘the new existentialism’ concentrates the full battery of phenomenological analysis upon the everyday sense of contingency ... it uncovers the complexities and safety devices in which freedom dissipates itself” (180). And therein lies the first step towards understanding the nature of consciousness. Husserlian phenomenology, with its implicit existentialist concerns, too begins with this recognition of the prejudiced consciousness which flattened under the triviality of everyday life characterises our ‘natural attitude’. Both Wilson and Husserl contend that ‘normal’ consciousness is partial, and it is not possible to make any sense of life from this partial mode of being. There is only a dull acceptance of how things apparently seem to us from our ‘natural standpoint’. Wilson conveys this state as the problem of ‘Robot’, which engenders an empty, meaningless and mechanical life where we act with passive intentionality and where the possibility of moving to other modes of being is reduced and thus limited.Wilson gives us a fresh and clear picture of man’s position in what Husserl calls the ‘natural standpoint’ or what he himself terms the ‘fallacy of insignificance’ —man’s inability to find meaning or significance in life. It is the everyday state of consciousness which Wilson calls the ‘Robot.’ Gnostics would call this Robot ‘Duality’, Gurdjieff calls it ‘sleep’, and Nietzsche labels it ‘Mechanical Intentions’. Heidegger would call such an existence ‘inauthentic’. It is Blake’s ‘Spectre’ —a stronghold of one’s own identity, personality, habits, etc. It is the concept of man as “an empty consciousness that passively receives data from the outside world” (Tredell Web). Robot is a human psychic condition which has become more complicated in modern culture. According to Wilson, “the Robot” is how our consciousness operates on ‘auto-pilot’, narrowing our perception so as to enable us to handle everyday life and least concerned about the need to get beyond it. He believed that “the Robot” controlled the part of our brains that, in our modern culture, has become over-used and over-developed.

TRADITIONS OF THE FRENCH THEATER OF ABSURD IN VICTOR SOLODCHUK’S PLAY “WHERE WE WERE EIGHT YEARS”

The article analyzes Solodchuk’s play «Where We Were Eight Years,» which was included in the electronic version of Anthology-24, published this year. The play is analyzed from the perspective of the French theater of the absurd, through the identification of common features in the play and in the plays written by S. Beckett and Ionesco, namely: a similar worldview, which is influenced by specific historical events, loss of the meaning of life, life without purpose and faith. The kaleidoscopic form of narrative organization, the absurdity and paradox of events, and the grotesque characters whose dialogues are reduced to a limited monologue, they do not understand each other. The form and style of the antidrama are subordinated to the effect of the evidence itself — the grotesque, the farce, brought to the point of excess, which reveals the monotony and meaninglessness of life. The desire to comprehend the universals of existence, the recurring patterns in human life are introduced into the text through the genre of parable, myth, symbol, and metaphor. The word loses its logical and grammatical connections, becomes grotesque, which leads to the loss of its meaning. The absurdist principle is also realized at the level of the figurative system of Solodchuk’s play, where the character appears as a multi-voiced entity. In the texts of the representatives of the theater of the absurd, attention is focused on material objects that replace the Other, so the role of things, objects, scenery increases, and to some extent they replace the object of communication for the characters. In Solodchuk’s play, the object is the Backpack, which is empowered with extraordinary abilities to take away aggression from the outside world. The open ending overcomes, even denies, the technique of ’exhaustiveness’ of dialogue in absurdist texts and appeals to the conceptual creation of the future.

A Study of Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot”

The theatre of the Absurd includes plays wherein humans are mere puppets full of irrational and illogical thoughts. From Aeschylus to Ibsen, the artists aimed at constructing meaning out of chaos and at gaining a momentary stay at confusion. So drama was then a temporary escape from the utter meaninglessness of life, a brief period when the audiences could dismiss their tensions and enter into a fictional world based on the assumption that man was a rational animal. But, ‘The Theatre of the Absurd’ ruthlessly shattered these notions, advocating instead their view of human being as an isolated existence and to represent life as it moves from nothingness whence it came to nothingness where it must go. The same notion is very much significant in Shakespeare’s line: “Life is a tale told by an idiot Full of sound and fury signifying nothing.” (Act V, Scene 5, Macbeth) Martin Esslin provided justification for the emergence of this new wave in the theatre, in his book: “The Theatre of the Absurd” which attempts to make man face up the world in which he lives and human conditions as they really are. As it was believed that the real dignity of man lies in his ability to face the reality in its senselessness, to accept it freely, without fear, without illusions and to laugh at it. This term is applied to a group of dramatists in the 1950s who shared the same predicament of man in the universe. Incidentally, the word ‘absurd’ is used in music which denotes a ‘jarring note’ or ‘discord’. This research paper is an attempt to study Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot,” a tragicomedy in two acts, published in 1952, originally in French as En attendant Godot and first produced in 1953. It is a true innovation in drama that successfully depicts the search for meaning in a world of chaos.

평생교육 현장에서의 미술활동이 여성노인의 웰다잉 인식에 미치는 영향

Objectives This study shows the effect of art activities on life of elderly women and their well-dying perception based on the existentialism.
 Methods This study conducted focus group interview(FGI) with seven elderly women aged 70 or older in D city in Korea and analyzed the phenomenon using Grounded theory by Strauss & Corbin with open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. It was intended to reveal the impact and process of art activities in elderly women on well-dying.
 Results As a result of the analysis, 66 concepts, 25 subcategories, and 11 core categories were derived. Based on the result, the process of recognizing well-dying by female elderly artists was derived in the final six stages. The derived stages are physical limitations, psychological frustrations, existential confrontation, critical situations, realization of existence, and formation of subjective identity. The main phenomenon of the study revealed by the analysis is art activities at the lifelong education center break away from the meaningless life and worthless being based on existentialism. Throughout concentration and immersion, new expertise was established and was also possible relationship with others through the formation of subjective identity.
 Conclusions With the establishment of an independent identity through the art activities, elderly women are no longer a passive and weak dependent people, they are the people who have active and leading attitude towards well-dying. The art activities helped to change the perception of being who leads the rest of their lives.

Jalan Hidup Filosofis Muḥammad Ibn Zakariyyā Al-Rāzī dan Relevansinya dengan Problem Psikologis Manusia Modern

Abstract Materialistic life orientation in the modern era is the reason for the emergence of various life problems, especially psychological problems. One of the psychological problems that arise is the meaninglessness of life or an existential vacuum. If it does not receive serious attention, then the problem has the potential to cause mental health disorders that, in fact, now plague many modern humans. Those who are sober, gradually begin to seek to find solutions to overcome the psychological burden by turning to certain life paths. Among them are those who dive into the world of spirituality, some go through philosophical paths such as Stoicism, which is now widely loved. Therefore, digging into various traditions to find the right solution in overcoming mental health disorders is paramount. Such efforts can also be made through Islamic philosophy. One philosopher who paid special attention to mental health issues was al-Rāzī. This is contained in his thoughts on Philosophic Life. This is the main discussion in this study. The results of this study illustrate that although such thinking appears to defend misunderstood Socrates’ life paths, yet the real philosophic life—instead of imitating Socrates—is to imitate the attributes of God. As for al-Rāzī’s application of the Philosophic Life: training the control of passions; not hurting other beings; not hurting ourself; does not go beyond the extreme limits (defect or excess); and imitate the attributes of God to the extent of man’s abilities. Keyword: Al-Rāzī, Mental Health, Philosophic Life

Meaning in life through work: A cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST) perspective

This article explores existential meaning-making from work using the cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST). To start with, we use the tenets of CEST to elaborate on how the cues from archetype work environments—a realization facilitating work environment (RfWE) and justification facilitating work environment (JfWE)—are interpreted by information-processing systems to imbue meaning in life (MiL) as internal or external manifestations of coherence, purpose, and significance. Next, we explain how individual differences in work centrality and proactive meaning-crafting ability moderate the impact of JfWE, but not of RfWE, on MiL. Finally, we create a nomological network of existential meaning states emerging from the simultaneous presence or absence of RfWE and JfWE. In summary, by applying the information-processing lens of CEST, we develop an integrated model that explains how work drives MiL, elucidates the resultant existential states, and assesses the role of individual differences in meaning-making.

Health as a movement between suffering of life and meaning in life for men who have experienced transitions in life.

Previous studies show that life transitions can have negative effects on men's lives and lead to health problems and meaninglessness in life. This study aims to deepen the understanding of men's health by exploring the movement between suffering of life and meaning in life when experienced life transitions. The study is anchored in Eriksson's caritative caring theory. Core concepts are health and the movement between suffering of life and meaning in life. The methodology is hermeneutical, and the study has a qualitative research design. Fifteen men from Norway participated in in-depth interviews in 2021. The interviews were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Four themes emerged in relation to the suffering of life; enduring separation from community, shame at being useless as a human being, grief over what has been lost in life, and being powerless and vulnerable in the face of a hopeless struggle. Three themes emerged in relation to meaning in life; realising what is most important in one's life gives strength, decision to live one's life brings joy in life and a positive attitude towards life gives freedom and awakens a new spark for life. Suffering of life emerges as a separation from relationships and society and as a perceived uselessness as a human being losing faith, control and feeling like a burden erodes dignity and trigger feelings of shame, guilt and degradation. Suffering of life manifests as loss of drive and spark for life. Life has meaning through finding the good in oneself, coming to know and believe in oneself and seeing new possibilities which bring about a spark for life, gratitude, dignity and freedom. Health exists in the movement between suffering of life and meaning in life, in pausing, recognising vulnerability, prioritising and reorienting oneself.

Absurdity of Human Existence in Albee’s Drama <em>Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?</em>

This research paper aims to analyze how Edward Albee's characters in his drama, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? live their absurd or meaningless lives. Through this paper, I have attempted to reveal the existential absurdity of human life in modern society using the literary theory of Existentialism. This research paper is a qualitative study of Albee's drama based on existential philosophers' literary theories: Sartre, Camus, and Beauvoir. The drama is employed as a primary source, and existential theory has been used to explain the characters' roles. This research paper finds that the two major characters in this drama, Martha and George, are trying to figure out who they are. They wish to have their own child in the future, but they cannot do it. As a result, they create an imaginary son to satisfy their desire for a baby. The conclusion of this paper is that Albee's characters, just as everyone in the real world, want their own issue that makes their life meaningful. The major characters in this drama want their own issue to run their dynasty forever. Therefore, they are looking for their identity in this modern world, but they are living their absurd lives.

"Confusion Of Life" In Few Late Poems Of Sylvia Plath

This article has endeoureved to show the confusion of life in the few poems of Sylvia Plath. Her late poems have shown the pessimistic life and the hopeless situation. Sylvia Plath as the notable author of America has presented the woman confusion in society with restriction of father and husband. Her keen interest in art has built her the immense figure of American literature. She is well known figure of American literature after World War Second. Her historical background shows the bafflement of life. Her family movement to another place of America after the death of her father shows the economic crisis of life. Her scholarship has helped her to join in Smith College. She had finished her B.A when she married to Ted Hughes. Her deep love to Ted Hughes brings the confusion in life that has invited death with suicide. Anyway, this article clearly depicts the life and barriers of human destiny. The faithless husband makes her life unhappy and sad. This article has maintained the pain and suffering of Plath. The Post War Period in which people loss hope and aspiration to live the life is shown in this research paper. Her later poems show the total meaningless life and her desire to do suicide. Sylvia Plath has been suffered by male society in which she is tortured by father and husband. The restriction by father and husband is shown in her poem Daddy. She has demonstrated the extreme hard life in her late poems Lady Lazarus and Daddy. She was really pessimistic figure in America and she became more famous after her death. Daddy and Lady Lazarus were published after her death. These poems are composed after the separation with her husband.

Existential youth depressions

To determine the clinical and psychopathological features of existential depression in youth. 53 male patients (16-25 years old) with diagnosis F31.3, F31.4, F32, F33 with existential themes of depressive experiences were studied by clinical and psychopathological method. The axial symptom of existential was over-value ideas about the meaninglessness of their own and human life with ideas of self-abasement, insolvency, low value, imperfection of society, which in most of the studied cases (79.2%) was accompanied by various degrees of severity suicidal thoughts and intentions. Three varieties were identified: with the prevalence of reflections on the meaninglessness of life (39.6%); with the prevalence of neurotic religiosity (28.3%); with an existential philosophical interpretation (32.1%). As a result of the study, the heterogeneity of existential depressions, a significant role of psychogenic factors in their formation were revealed, as a high suicidal risk. Existential depressive states differed in duration, severity of depressive symptoms, high frequency of non-suicidal self-neglect and suicidal risk.

“Outside of here, It’s Death or Hope?!”: Exploring despair and Hope in T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ and Samuel Beckett’s ‘Endgame’

T.S Eliot’s masterpiece poem, The Waste Land, and Samuel Beckett’s absurdist play, Endgame were both written in the shadow of great disasters. The Waste Land has tones of desolation and despair and humanity is shown at the brink of extinction. Beckett is known for his association with the Theatre of the Absurd where suffering and the meaninglessness of life were stressed on. Endgame presents the disillusionment of man in a decayed and meaningless modern world. Written after World War I, Eliot shows a bleak world in the wasteland of Europe. Beckett published Endgame fifty-five years after The Waste Land and had the dubious benefit of having witnessed the second World War. Living under post-atomic threat, Beckett’s vision appears conspicuously darker than Eliot’s. The purpose of this paper is to explore despair and dejection in both the works; the isolation of modern man; the meaninglessness of relationships; and the spiritual barrenness in a post-war world. At the same time, the study attempts to look for glimpses of hope and redemption in the barren lands. Through the utter despair that makes up both works, they paradoxically promote an acceptance of our fate and teach us to value life in all its imperfections.

TÜRK SİNEMASINDA KARA MİZAHIN SİNEMASAL SERÜVENİ: AZİZLER VE SENİ BULDUM YA FİLMLERİNDE DİJİTAL ÇAĞIN PSİKOPATOLOJİSİ

Öz: Komedi ve trajedi antik Yunan’dan beri en fazla işlenen iki tür olmuştur. Özellikle komedi türü her coğrafyada kendisine özgü biçim ve temalara bürünen en genel geçer tür olarak sanatın her formunda yerini almıştır. Antik Yunan’dan itibaren de hem trajik hem de komik olan unsurların biraradalığı sözkonusu olmuş ve trajikomik olarak nitelendirilmiştir. Modernizm ile birlikte trajikomik unsurlar; modern dünyanın saçmalığı, duyarsızlığı, hayatın anlamsızlığı, acı ve şiddetin olağan akışı ile mutlu son vaad etmeyen bir dünya kurgusunu içerir. Kendi coğrafyamızda ise trajikomiği türsel bir anlatı yöntemi ile ele alan yazın ve film anlatılarından kara mizah olarak bahsedilmiştir. Nasreddin hoca’dan Aziz Nesin’e kadar Türk mizahı aslında karamizah ekseninde günümüze kadar gelmiş ve en ilişkili alan olan sinemayı da etkilemiştir. Bu anlamda bu çalışma ile karamizah türünün Türk sinemasında hangi temel motifler üzerine inşa edildiği, kara mizahı ortaya çıkaran toplumsal koşulların neler olduğu noktası kavramsal ve tarihsel perspektiften irdelenmiştir. Modern dünyanın saçmalığı ve duyarsızlığı, hayatın anlamsızlığı üzerine kurulan kara mizah anlatılarının çağdaş örneklerinin merkezinde ise; sosyal medyanın esiri olmuş dijital öznelerle karşılaşılmıştır. Bu çalışmada pandemi sürecinde üretilmiş ve pandemi koşullarında dijital platformlarda izleyicisi ile buluşmuş Azizler ve Seni Buldum Ya filmleri üzerinden kara mizahın çağdaş Türk sinemasındaki yükselişi dijital teknolojilerin insanları dönüştürdüğü trajikomik süreç psikanalitik ve tür eleştirisi metodolojisi ile açıklanmaya çalışılmıştır.

Siddhartha as a Journey of Self-Discovery

This paper deals with the protagonist, Siddhartha’s dissatisfaction with his life, mental turmoil, inquisitiveness in knowing his existence and his quest for self-Discovery in the novel Siddhartha. This novel was written by Hermann Hesse and was published in 1922. It was his masterpiece, which shows his journey to the East, the influence of Buddhist philosophy upon him and his autobiographical elements that pave a way for one’s journey to Spiritual knowledge in this physical world. As the novel was written in the First World War years, the search for spiritualism would naturally be the interest of most of Europeans who found Europe devoid of it. So, Hess made his journey to the East (India) in quest of spiritualism as the protagonist of the novel does. One major objective of the research work is to explore different factors that enable Siddhartha to discover his self. Why Siddhartha is in search of self is the research question. Siddharth is in search of self since he is not happy and satisfied with love of his parents and friend and finds his life meaningless and devoid of freedom. Like the writer, Siddhartha comes across a lot of illusions that human beings encounter in their daily life. He passes through multiple vicissitudes and experiences in his life through sufferings and salvation. His such self-actualization with social life and nature ultimately leads him to attain nirvana. Thus, his quest for self-discovery indicates elements of autobiographical elements, existentialism, and self-actualizing tendency which is based on Carl Rogers’ humanistic psychology. As for the theoretical modality, Jean-Paul Sartre’s theory of Existentialism is applied to explore Siddhartha’s search for self, which is like Europeans’ search for self due to devastation made by world war and Siddhartha Guatam’s search for self due to his dissatisfaction with the world.

Resilience in Wives with Homosexual Husband

Wives who find out their husbands are homosexuals often experience emotional surges such as disappointment, stress, depression and lead to meaninglessness of life, although in particular reason some are stood up from the sufferings. This study aims to determine the condition of resilience of wives whose husbands are homosexuals and the factors that influence them. Hope the results of the study will be useful for wives, families or households, especially in Indonesia, if they have problems with homosexual husbands. Some of them are able to develop resilience skills, at least they can be lesson for motivation and inspiration for wives, especially in Indonesia who are homosexuals in order to develop resilience skills. This research uses qualitative methods with a phenomenological approach. The participants of this study were two wives with homosexual husbands who lived in Central Java and Yogyakarta. Data collection was based on interviews and observations conducted directly at the participants' places, namely Jepara and Batang and through video calls. The results of this study showed that both participants were able to develop resilience after learning that their husband was homosexual. The stages are based on aspects such as emotional regulation, impulse control, optimism, causal analysis, empathy, self-efficacy and reaching out. Cultural factors, spirituality, social support and interpersonal communication skills were factors that influenced both participants in developing resilience so that they can go through the dark period of suffering to a life of light.

Alienation in Families and the Breakdown in Children’s Educational Process: Ann Tyler’s Teenage Wasteland (1983)

This research article highlights that postmodern era after the modern period causes fragmentation because of the existence of alienation and isolation senses in family units and ends up undesirable failure in children’s educational process as reflected in American writer Ann Tyler’s Teenage Wasteland. Thereby, these are concurrently the basics of modernism that destructs human lives. Similar to T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, Tyler emphasizes the existence of a dramatic monologue deriving from the disillusionment in the infertile land and the alienation in social living. Tyler specifies the presence of a meaningless life and alienation for children. At the same time, Tyler concerns how parents become unable to deal with their children in their intensive working life. She hints that children become unsuccessful in their educational process due to their parents’ intensive working. Therefore, the teenager and his parents have mutual lack of communication in their alienated worlds. A “wasteland” in the target short story implies having the sense of loneliness which causes failure in children’s educational world and rises the disturbance in family units. Accordingly, family members are the victims of their working life and embrace the senses of alienation and isolation in their inner worlds. Therefore, this article will pursue a psychoanalytical consideration in the selected short story.

The Land and the Waste: Meaninglessness and Absurdity in T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land

After the World War-1, there spread chaos and disillusionment in society, faith got shattered and life became meaningless. Jean-Paul Sartre’s version of Existentialism is based on this meaninglessness and absurdity. Man faces an absurd and meaningless existence in this chaotic world. Thus these two are the main tropes of Sartre’s philosophy. T. S. Eliot also lived in that chaotic age and composed his long narrative poem The Waste Land (1930) after the World War. This poem is based on the consequences of the war that caused absurdity and chaos depriving human life of real significance and value. This study explores and analyses these aspects of meaninglessness and absurdity in The Waste Land (1930) in the light of Sartre’s philosophy and contends to say that almost all of the characters presented in the poem encounter meaningless and chaotic lives. Their lives are without any real purpose and are quite insignificant in a chaotic and disorderly world. So the land is full of the waste only. This meaningless life is nothing but a heap of the waste. By presenting this picture of chaotic life, Eliot intends to forward a solution in the form of rebirth of the lost religious faith and moral values. This research is significant because the aspects of meaninglessness and absurdity accurately relate to our current times where human beings face real existential threat and the significance of life is being lost. This awareness may lead to an immediate solution. Moreover, this study may provoke further research in this area in order to bring out the relevance of literary texts to all times and human life everywhere.

MAN IN SOCIO-CULTURAL LIFE: BETWEEN SYSTEM AND ANTI-SYSTEM

The anti-system is considered as a socio-cultural community of people whose worldview is built on the principle of denying and devaluing the existing reality and realizing the need to transform it. The real socio-cultural reality is threatened with destruction in order to implement the postulates of the anti-systemic doctrine, although this doctrine is contradictory and non-viable, and therefore its provisions cannot be implemented at the moment or at all. The reasons for the emergence of anti-systems are clarified: the crisis state of society (political and spiritual crises), the growing sense of deprivation and the presence of ideas and institutions that do not belong to the dominant culture in society. It is shown that intercultural interactions are a necessary condition for the formation of anti-systemic doctrines and organizations because in this process fragments of a foreign cultural picture of the world penetrate into society; fragments, which sometimes turn out to be incompatible with the local original culture. As soon as a part of people, who are usually intellectually developed and have a broad outlook, forms a syncretic, mosaic worldview from arbitrarily selected fragments of native and foreign cultures, the emergence of an anti-system becomes only a matter of time. It was found that a favourable environment for the emergence of anti-systems is pseudomorphosis as a state in which one society culturally and politically dominates another, imposing its forms and institutions on it, which are not compatible with the way of life of the recipient. As a result, all the creative forces of the host society turn out to be put at the service of supporting foreign political and cultural forms, which often leads to a sense of the meaninglessness of life and the injustice of the real socio-cultural reality. It is substantiated that in a state of deprivation on one side of the contradiction, there are certain expectations of the subject related to his needs, interests, beliefs, ideas, but on the other side of this contradiction are the real conditions for their satisfaction. It is noted that pseudomorphosis is an important factor for the formation of an antisystem, but the genesis of an antisystem can occur without it. It has been found that in the modern world, the anti-systemic potential is directly related to globalization, which made any ideas and doctrines available, encouraged millions of people to migrate to foreign lands, destroyed many cultural institutions that were in demand in autochthonous societies, and introduced foreign elements into the social environment foreign political-economic and socio-cultural standards, and therefore the modern world found itself in the grip of several anti-systems at once, unequal in strength and scale.

Resurgent back‐to‐the‐land and the cultivation of a renewed countryside

AbstractIn connection to concerns about, for example, climate change, peak oil, pandemics and the depopulation of many rural areas, there has been a counter‐migration from urban to rural areas in past decades. An important part of this counter‐migration is the so‐called 'back‐to‐the‐land' migration of former urban residents who move to rural areas and adopt primarily agrarian lifestyles. Through a review of 48 migration letters in which migrants write about their experiences of moving from urban to rural areas to commence agriculture, this article explores the underlying ideals and agricultural practices of the back‐to‐land phenomena and discusses what significance this form of agricultural migration may have for understanding broader sustainability transformations and contemporary rural change. Important questions concern: What kinds of motives, practices and ideals underpin back‐to‐the‐land migration? What relevance does “back‐to‐the‐land” have for how we comprehend rurality and how the current food landscape is changing? Based on the letter reviews, this article illuminates four interconnected themes with regard to back‐to‐the‐landers practices and ideals. Back‐to‐the‐land as (i) rebelling against payroll work and meaningless lives in the cities, (ii) reinvention and retrotopia, (iii) reconnecting with nature and cultivating resilient alternatives and (iv) resistance and silent revolution. The article argues that the current back‐to‐land migration contributes to the construction of a renewed rurality—a reinvented form of rurality—that are adapted to suit both present and future needs in a world that is perceived as becoming more unruly. The article further suggests that, although back‐to‐the‐land migration may not yet have any significant material implications on the current food system, the ideals and practices the back‐to‐the‐landers profess, provide an important imaginary of how we can comprehend an alternative ‘rurality’ that reconnect people, land and food in more sustainable ways, through, for example, benign ways of practising agriculture and organising the food system. In this light, the current back‐to‐the‐land phenomena can be seen as a particular form of sustainability migration of voluntary peasantry that is based on retrotopian ideals of a rural past that is paired with progressive sustainability practices of the present.