Peter Swirski
{{short description|Canadian novelist and literary critic}}
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| occupation = Novelist, Literary Critic
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| nationality = Canadian
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Peter Swirski is a Canadian novelist, scholar, and literary critic{{cite web|url=http://www.philstar.com/campus/campus-gazette/2013/06/20/955915/author-peter-swirski-keen-teaching-manila|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130702093222/http://www.philstar.com/campus/campus-gazette/2013/06/20/955915/author-peter-swirski-keen-teaching-manila|url-status=dead|archive-date=July 2, 2013|title=Author Peter Swirski keen on teaching in Manila|last=Esteves|first=Patricia|work=The Philippine Star|date=June 20, 2013|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} featured in Canadian Who's Who.{{cite web|title=Canadian Who's Who|url=https://canadianwhoswho.ca/
}} He is the author and editor of 19 nonfictions, including the prize-winning{{citation needed|date=March 2020}} Ars Americana, Ars Politica (2010) and the staple of American popular culture studies From Lowbrow to Nobrow (2005). His other studies include American Utopia and Social Engineering (2011), American Political Fictions (2015), American Utopia: Literature, Society, and the Human Use of Human Beings (2020, Routledge textbook), and the digital-futurological bestseller From Literature to Biterature (2013). He is also the leading authority on the late writer and philosopher Stanisław Lem.{{cite web|title=When Swirski met Lem: Scholar Peter Swirski talks to TFN about one of the world's greatest sci-fi writers, the late Stanisław Lem|url=https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/when-swirski-met-lem-scholar-peter-swirski-talks-to-tfn-about-one-of-the-worlds-greatest-sci-fi-writers-the-late-stanislaw-lem-2212|last=Borowski|first=Jacek|work=The First News|date=September 12, 2018|accessdate=February 19, 2019}}
Life and career
Among other appointments, Peter Swirski was formerly a professor and research director at the Helsinki Institute for Advanced Studies in Finland,{{cite web|title=Peter Swirski: Two Cultures... and the Twain Shall Never Meet|url=http://www.helsinki.fi/collegium/english/news-videos/video/swirski.html|website=Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} Distinguished Professor of American Studies and Literature at Sun Yat-sen University,{{cite web|url=http://fls.sysu.edu.cn/node/144|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170313214333/http://fls.sysu.edu.cn/node/144|url-status=dead|archive-date=2017-03-13|title=Peter Swirski|website=Sun Yat-sen University|accessdate=2017-03-13}} a n associate professor and director of american studies at HKU, an assistant professor and senior research associate at the University of Alberta,{{cite web|url=http://www.wirth.ualberta.ca/Senior%20Research%20Associate/Peter%20Swirski.aspx|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170313214629/http://www.wirth.ualberta.ca/Senior%20Research%20Associate/Peter%20Swirski.aspx|url-status=dead|archive-date=March 13, 2017|title=Peter Swirski|website=Wirth Institute, University of Alberta|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} and an honorary professor in American literature at South China University of Technology.{{cite web|title=Who is Writing/Rewriting American History? Internationally Renowned Expert Peter Swirski Gives a Lecture|website=South China University of Technology|url=http://www2.scut.edu.cn/languages_en/2015/0717/c6414a95314/page.htm|accessdate=February 19, 2019}}
- {{cite web|title=国际外语界知名专家Peter Swirski教授为我院师生做题为"美国英语的文学及社会历史"的讲座|language=Chinese|website=South China University of Technology|url=http://www2.scut.edu.cn/sfl/2013/0103/c1345a48690/page.htm}} In the mid-1980s he worked for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).{{citation needed|date=March 2020}} He obtained his doctorate summa cum laude from McGill University in Montreal, in 1996.{{cite web|url=https://www.hku.hk/press/news_detail_5934.html|title=European Television Interviews American Studies - Professor Peter Swirski|date=March 10, 2009}}{{cite web|url=https://www.rappler.com/life-and-style/books/33777-conversation-with-peter-swirski|title=Author Peter Swirski keen on teaching in Manila|last=Jimenez|first=Florianne|work=Rappler|date=July 15, 2013|accessdate=February 19, 2019}}
Swirski's 2005 study of American popular and "nobrow" cultures, From Lowbrow to Nobrow, was followed up by several other books on "nobrow" literature, culture, and other forms of "artertainment" (his coinage): American Crime Fiction (2016), a collection of critical essays When Highbrow Meets Lowbrow: Popular Culture and the Rise of Nobrow (2017), and The Art of Artertainment: Nobrow, American Style (2019). His book Ars Americana, Ars Politica (2010) received a positive review from the Financial Times.{{cite web|title=FINANCIAL TIMES January 28, 2011|url=http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/38db1210-2a63-11e0-804a-00144feab49a.html#axzz1LGdiWzAS}}
File:Peter Swirski on BBC Forum, 2012.jpg
A number of his monographs, collections, as well as articles from the Times Literary Supplement to the MIT Technology Review and other venues deal with the analysis of the work of the writer and philosopher Stanislaw Lem.{{citation needed|date=February 2019}}
In 2012 Ars Americana was the subject of Professor Swirski's plenary lecture at UNE's Institute for Global Humanities alongside Noam Chomsky and other speakers.{{cite web|title=Ars Americana, Ars Politica: Of Democracy and Its Deficits|url=https://www.une.edu/calendar/2012/ars-americana-ars-politica-democracy-and-its-deficits|website=University of New England|accessdate=May 28, 2019}} In the summer and fall of 2013, he was a speaker at the 4th Philippine Literary festival in Manila,{{cite web|title=THE END OF LITERARY HISTORY |url=http://www.ateneo.edu/news/features/end-literary-history|website=Ateneo de Manila University|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} and a BBC World Service panelist at the Hong Kong International Literary Festival.{{cite web|title=Peter Swirski |url=http://www.festival.org.hk/writers/peter-swirski/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131004215823/http://www.festival.org.hk/writers/peter-swirski/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=October 4, 2013 |website=Hong Kong International Literary Festival|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} In March 2015, he was a keynoter at the Millennium International Documentary Film Festival in Brussels.{{cite web|title=Millennium International Documentary Film Festival in Brussels|url=http://festivalmillenium.org/fr/content/les-predictions-realisees-de-la-science-fiction|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170702072606/http://festivalmillenium.org/fr/content/les-predictions-realisees-de-la-science-fiction|url-status=dead|archive-date=July 2, 2017|website=Millennium International Documentary Film Festival|accessdate=February 19, 2019}} In 2022 he was an invited speaker at the Santa Fe Institute's Interplanetary Project.{{cite web |last1=Santa Fe Institute |title=The Cassandra Syndrome, or, How Not to be a Futurologist |url=https://interplanetaryfest.org/event/introduction-to-ikarie-xb-1/ |website=InterplanetaryProject |publisher=SFI |access-date=3 November 2022}}
Bibliography
= Books =
- American Utopia: Literature, Society, and the Human Use of Human Beings (2020)
- The Art of Artertainment: Nobrow, American Style (2019)
- When Highbrow Meets Lowbrow: Popular Fiction and the Rise of Nobrow (2017)
- [http://nelsondemille.net/newsletter/?id=59 American Crime Fiction: A Cultural History of Nobrow Literature as Art] (2016)
- American Political Fictions: War on Errorism in Contemporary American Literature, Culture, and Politics (2015)
- Stanislaw Lem: Philosopher of the Future (2015)
- Lemography: Stanislaw Lem in the Eyes of the World (2014)
- Stanislaw Lem--Selected Letters to Michael Kandel (2014)
- [http://criticalmargins.com/2013/09/11/interview-peter-swirski/ From Literature to Biterature: Lem, Turing, Darwin, and Explorations in Computer Literature, Philosophy of Mind, and Cultural Evolution] (2013)
- American Utopia and Social Engineering in Literature, Social Thought, and Political History (2011)[http://www.themontrealreview.com/2009/American-Utopia-and-Social-Engineering-in-Literature-Social-Thought-and-Political-History.php book review: American Utopia and Social Engineering in Literature, Social Thought, and Political History]
- Ars Americana, Ars Politica: Partisan Expression in Contemporary American Literature and Culture (2010)
- Literature, Analytically Speaking: Explorations in the Theory of Interpretation, Analytic Aesthetics, and Evolution (Cognitive Approaches to Literature and Culture) (2010)
- I Sing the Body Politic: History as Prophecy in Contemporary American Literature (2009)
- Of Literature and Knowledge: Explorations in Narrative Thought Experiments, Evolution, and Game Theory (2007)
- All Roads Lead to the American City (2007)
- The Art and Science of Stanislaw Lem (2006)
- From Lowbrow to Nobrow (2005)
- Between Literature and Science: Poe, Lem, and Explorations in Aesthetics, Cognitive Science, and Literary Knowledge (2000)
- A Stanislaw Lem Reader (Rethinking Theory) (1997)
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [https://independent.academia.edu/PeterSwirski Academia]
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Category:Canadian literary critics
Category:American literary critics