Otázky mediality v Pražské škole? Zpětný pohled
Questions of mediality in the Prague School? A retrospective look

Summary/Abstract: The article addresses problems of mediality in the context of the Prague School in its classical period. Drawing from John Guillory’s study “Genesis of the Media Concept”, we work on the hypothesis that new technical media and technologies exerted pressure in the theoretical discourse of the Prague School, via the mutual reflexion of the avantgarde (Nezval, Štyrský, functionalist architecture, the avantgarde theater) and Structuralist thought, to formulate a shift in the delimitation of art. First, we observe the variety of influences that the discourse on film and modern and avantgarde theater had on the Structuralist concepts of the sign, the understanding of the actor or of temporality in art. We further note the tension between linguistic and architectural functionalism in the Prague School thinking and how this tension translates into Mukařovský’s concept of the aesthetic function. Functionalist avantgarde architecture, as we observe, fundamentally influenced Mukařovský’s cultural anthropological theory of functions. On the basis of these converging factors, leading, among other things, to the growing strategic importance of the concept of communication, we conclude by characterizing what we call latent medial traces of certain notions and returning ideas of Prague School theories (apart from sign, the concepts of semantic gesture and unintentionality).

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