Satu Taskinen

Satu Taskinen (FI): „I try to add to awareness.“

A perfect Austrian or a perfect person would be one, who knows what they are doing. Would know him or herself in the meaning of this ancient oracle who told people: “Erkenne dich selbst” – know thy self. We don’t, really. We just think we do. We keep on screaming: I am not angry. I think this is very important to see, if we want to change something. We should see what we do and understand why we do it. Why we are afraid of the others so much. This is of course not new. Many feminist philosophers for instance have been writing about this since decades, like Julia Kristeva. But this way of thinking is now very unpopular. It is maybe too slow, which is understandable, because the problems are big and people need to be helped fast. But we need it all: politics and actions and also literature and philosophy. They should not be mixed as to be the same thing and then judged like that. We need to help the refugees now, of course, for instance by donating for reliable organizations and raising voice. And also: getting to know one self is not egocentric but taking responsibility of ones actions and feelings. Creating more possibilities and answers to worldwide serious problems of poverty and climate change and everything which is creating suffering. It is all in our brains: the good and the bad. The problem and the solution, in a way or another. Thus, for the long run: the basic research should not be forgotten. I really do believe in quantum leaps and development. Even in the human brain. It has happened before, why not now? Why should we now be on the peak of anything? And not in the middle

privateSatu Taskinen (Photo: private)

On 08.07.2015 at 11:15 Julia Schiefer wrote:

That is very interesting. May I add something about literature and politics? In the light of the amount of information one gets through mass media and taking into consideration that so many ways of communication exist with more and more people using new media, wouldn’t you make out a need to promote things which are so easily forgotten/overlooked nowadays, to make them visible. Of course it is important to have people being able to judge information and take position. But it is also important to be able to take a different stance, eg. a poetic one.

Take for example poetry which is experiencing some hype now in Germany but in general big publishing companies have phased out their product line of poetry. To face this development it needs people of passion to be active and to spread poetry. I think this also applies to the complete literary sector.

Actually that is in my eyes what CROWD is doing, too. The CROWD is a network of so called “literary activits” which needs to be defined by each participant. What do you have in mind when you hear that term?

On 08.07.2015 at 18:03 Satu Taskinen wrote:

“Literary activist” sounds great. It gives literature an important role. Which it absolutely should have. In this term I find a lot of energy and wonderfully much space to experiment. Art is active and experimenting. You only know what comes out when you see the result.

On 12.07.2015 at 20:54 Julia Schiefer wrote: 

I see. Very well, what are you working on or experimenting with right now?

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