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POSTMODERNISM

POSTMODERNISM. I. POSTMODERNISM. A. M eans many things, ranging from social conditions to a critical perspective B. The "modern" period occurred during & after the Enlightenment 1. Rise of the individual & the beginnings of capitalism & industrialism

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POSTMODERNISM

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  1. POSTMODERNISM

  2. I. POSTMODERNISM • A. Means many things, ranging from social conditions to a critical perspective • B. The "modern" period occurred during & after the Enlightenment • 1. Rise of the individual & the beginnings of capitalism & industrialism • 2. Associated with writers like James Joyce, Marcel Proust, T.S. Eliot, & William Faulkner • 3. Connected to artists like Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, along with Dadaism & surrealism • 4. In music, modernist composers include Igor Stravinsky & Bela Bartok

  3. Postmodernism, con’t. • C. Postmodern refers to 4 interrelated phenomenon (Denzin, 1991): • 1. An artistic, aesthetic movement called postmodernism (seen in media & architecture, as well as traditional art forms) • 2. A historical transformation of society following World War II • 3. A new form of theorizing about the contemporary historical moment • 4. Social, cultural, & economic life under late capitalism • D. Influential postmodern theorists include Jean Baudrillard, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault & Jean-Francoise Lyotard

  4. Postmodernism, con’t. • E. Some key concepts: • 1. Truth & knowledge • a. Postmodernism disavows truth, especially the notion of absolutes & universals. • b. Knowledge is a discourse that becomes an accepted statement of truth, or "metanarrative“ • 1) Metanarratives set their own criteria or standards for what counts as truth (e.g. science) • 2) Must be skeptical about metanarratives • c. Postmodernism also attacks the law of non-contradiction (that an object cannot be both A & not A), seeing it as an instrument for control

  5. Postmodernism, con’t. • 2. History & subject • a. Postmodern society tends toward disconnection & fragmentation (not order & definition • b. Postmodernism "eschews history; humans exist in fragmented current moments." (Gill, p. 202) • c. Thus reflects "the end of history“ (end of metanarrative of linear historical progress)

  6. Postmodernism, con’t. • d. Postmodernism also argues for the "death of the subject“ • 1) Individuals occupy positions in various language games or "communication circuits," (where we are both sender-receiver) • 2) The self is socially & linguistically constructed, a position which generally denies autonomy & individualism • e. The postmodern critic asserts that the author/artist/creator of discourse has no special privileged status in determining meaning

  7. Postmodernism, con’t. • 3. Embracing low/popular culture. • a. Consists of a “degraded landscape of schlock & kitsch, of TV series & Reader's Digest culture, of advertising & motels, of the late show & the grade-B Hollywood film," with romance novels, murder mysteries, science-fiction, etc. (David Lodge, 1988) • b. Popular culture integrated with all other culture, with past & present mixed together • c. Gill notes that such art can be "sexually explicit, rebellious…critical of both political & social norms. It also is schizophrenic & disorderly" (p. 203)

  8. Postmodernism, con’t • F. Some postmodern elements: • 1. Simulacra of experience--a type of "virtual reality" or hyperreality, as in video games • 2. Pastiche--a mixture of elements not normally connected; a "crazy quilt" of images, etc. • 3. Self-referential elements--there is a self-consciousness that occurs through multiple allusions & intertextuality • 4. Spectacle--over inflated staging of events, designed to promote euphoria • 5. Overcommodified--focus on clutter & consumption • 6. Contradictory images —paradox is embraced

  9. Postmodernism, con’t • G. Postmodern American society is "culture as garage sale” (Gitlin, 1989) • H. Postmodern examples include architecture, Andy Warhol's paintings, Disneyland, Las Vegas, shopping malls (especially mega malls), William Burroughs, Monty Python, science-fiction/action films, MTV, etc. • I. Todd Gitlin (1989) offers this perspective on postmodernism: • “It self-consciously splices genres, attitudes, styles. It relishes the blurring or juxtaposition of forms (fiction-non-fiction), stances (straight-ironic), moods (violent-comic), cultural levels (high-low) . . . It takes pleasure in the play of surfaces, & derides the search for depth as mere nostalgia.“

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