Postmodernism

Introduction to
Postmodernism
Why Reality Isn’t What
It Used to Be
Deconstructing Mrs. Miller
Questions
1. What is postmodernism?
2. Why should we care about it?
3. Have you received a modern or postmodern education?
4. What does postmodernism have to say about your identity?
5. What does postmodernism have to say about truth, beauty,

and goodness?
6. How postmodernism is impacting K-12 education, religion, the

arts, and our daily lives.
as Timeline
Evolution of Western Thought
Naturalistic
Theocentric
Economic
Humanistic
TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Timeline
Modernity
RENAISSANCE TO ABOUT 1900 (+/- 30 years)

Baudrillard:
 Early modernity: Renaissance to Industrial Revolution
 Modernity: Industrial Revolution
 Postmodernity: Period of mass media
 The world according to white Anglo-Saxon males from Europe

Timeline
Your Place in History
14th C 1900 2000

 Modern  Modernism  Postmodernism
You are here

Timeline
Your Place in History

as
14th C 1900 2000
 Modern  Modernism  Postmodernism
Your teachers were / are here

Newtonian Order
Modernity
 God, reason and progress
 There was a center to the universe.
 Progress is based upon knowledge, and man is

capable of discerning objective absolute truths
in science and the arts.
 Modernism is linked to capitalism—progressive

economic administration of world
 Modernization of 3rd world countries (imposition

of modern Western values)

What Is Language?
Language & Truth

as
 People are the same everywhere
 There are universal laws and truths
 Knowledge is objective, independent of

culture, gender, etc.
 Language is a man-made tool that refers to

real things / truths
 I, the subject, speak language
 I have a discernible self
 The self is the center of existence

Purpose of Literature
Liberal Humanism: View of Literature
 Good literature is of timeless significance.
 The text will reveal constants, universal truths,

about human nature, because human nature
itself is constant and unchanging.

Death of the Old Order
Modernism
 Early 1900s:
 World War I
 Worldwide poverty & exploitation
PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM
Death of the Old Order
Modernism
 Early 1900s:
 World War I
 Worldwide poverty & exploitation
 Intellectual upheaval:
 Freud: psychoanalysis
 Marx: class struggle
 Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Neitzsche
 Picasso, Stravinsky, Kafka, Proust,

Brecht, Joyce, Eliot
The Bending of Time & Space
Relativism
 Einstein: relativity, quantum mechanics
 Refutation of Newtonian science
 Time is relative
 Matter and energy are one
 Light as both particle and wave
E=mc2  Universe is strange
Breaking the Rules
Modernist Art
 Cubism
 Surrealism
 Dadaism
 Expressionism
Breaking the Rules
Modernist Art
 Cubism
 Surrealism
 Dadaism
 Expressionism
Breaking the Rules
Modernist Art
 Cubism
 Surrealism
 Dadaism
 Expressionism
Breaking the Rules
Modernist Art
 Cubism
 Surrealism
 Dadaism
 Expressionism
A World with No Center
Modernist Literature
“Things fall apart,

The centre cannot hold,
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”
--Yeats, “The Second Coming”
Breaking the Rules
Modernist Literature
 Emphasis on impressionism and subjectivity
 Movement away from “objective” third-party

narration
 Tendency toward reflexivity and self-

consciousness
 Obsession with the psychology of self
 Rejection of traditional aesthetic theories
 Experimentation with language
Acceptance of a New Age
What is Postmodernism?
 Continuation of modernist view
 Does not mourn loss of history, self, religion,

center
 A term applied to all human sciences —

anthropology, psychology, architecture, history,
etc.
 Reaction to modernism; systematic skepticism
 Anti-foundational
POSTMODERNISM
Acceptance of a New Age
What is Postmodernism?
 The Enlightenment project is dead.
POSTMODERNISM
Culture & Capital
Frederick Jameson
 Modernism and postmodernism are cultural formations that

accompany specific stages of capitalism
1. Market capitalism: 18th-19th C.

Steam locomotive Realism
2. Monopoly capitalism: Late 19th C to WWII

Electricity and automobile Modernism
3. Multinational/consumer capitalism
Nuclear and electronics Postmodernism
POSTMODERNISM
The End of Master Narratives
Postmodernism: Basic Concepts
 Life just is
 Rejection of all master narratives
 All “truths” are contingent cultural constructs
 Skepticism of progress; anti-technology bias
 Sense of fragmentation and decentered self
 Multiple conflicting identities
 Mass-mediated reality
POSTMODERNISM
The End of Master Narratives
 All versions of reality are SOCIAL

CONSTRUCTS
 Concepts of good and evil
 Metaphors for God
 Language
 The self
 Gender
 EVERYTHING!
POSTMODERNISM
Language As Social Construct
 Language is a social construct that “speaks”

& identifies the subject
 Knowledge is contingent, contextual and

linked to POWER
 Truth is pluralistic, dependent upon the

frame of reference of the observer
 Values are derived from ordinary social

practices, which differ from culture to
culture and change with time.
 Values are determined by manipulation and

domination
POSTMODERNISM
Relativism & Pluralism
Richard Rorty (1931-)

 A “pragmatic philosopher”
 Anti-foundationalist
 No reality independent of our minds
 Truth is the result of inter-subjective agreement

between members of a community
 We must choose between self-defeating
relativism or solidarity of thought within our
group
 The goal of the “search for truth” is to help us
carry out practical tasks and create a fairer and
more democratic society
POSTMODERNISM
The Observer is King
Postmodern View of Language
 Observer is a participant/part of what is observed
 Receiver of message is a component of the

message
 Information becomes information only when

contextualized
 The individual (the subject) is a cultural construct
 Consider role of own culture when examining

others
 All interpretation is conditioned by cultural

perspective and mediated by symbols and
practice
POSTMODERNISM
Play and Parody
PostModern Literature
 Extreme freedom of form and expression
 Repudiation of boundaries of narration & genre
 Intrusive, self-reflexive author
 Parodies of meta-narratives
 Deliberate violation of standards of sense and

decency (which are viewed as methods of social
control)
 Integration of everyday experience, pop culture
POSTMODERNISM
Fragmented Identities
PostModern Literature
 Parody, play, black humor, pastiche
 Nonlinear, fragmented narratives
 Ambiguities and uncertainties
 Conspiracy and paranoia
 Ironic detachment
 Linguistic innovations
 Postcolonial, global-English literature
POSTMODERNISM
Binary Oppositions
Modernity PostModern
 History as fact  Written by the victors
 Faith in social order  Cultural pluralism
 Family as central unit  Alternate families
 Authenticity of originals  Hyper-reality (MTV)
 Mass consumption  Niches; small group identity
POSTMODERNISM
Modern or Postmodern?
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
A gay Southern Baptist who practices

Buddhist meditation and believes in
the Big Bang theory.
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
POSTMODERNISM
An Epochal Shift in Thinking
PostModernism
 “The narrative is unravelled, the author is dead, the
Enlightenment project is toast, and history is history.”
 “An epochal shift in the basic condition in being.”
--Geoffrey Nunberg
POSTMODERNISM
Battle of World Views
PostModernism
A Global Battle:
THE OBJECTIVISTS vs. THE CONSTRUCTIVISTS
POSTMODERNISM
My Way
PostModernism
OBJECTIVISTS
“When I said during my presidential bid that I
would only bring Christians and Jews into the
government, I hit a firestorm. How dare you
maintain that those who believe in the Judeo-
Christian values are better qualified to govern
America than Hindus and Muslims?' My simple
answer is, `Yes, they are.'”
-from Pat Robertson's "The New World Order"
POSTMODERNISM
Metaphors Kill
PostModernism
People were burned at the

stake for believing there was
more than one version of
reality.
POSTMODERNISM
God is Not Dead
PostModernism
Our public schools have become

a postmodern battleground.
POSTMODERNISM
God is Not Dead
PostModernism
You can be a Christian

(or Buddhist, or Hindu, etc.)
in the postmodern world.
POSTMODERNISM
We Live in the Middle
PostModernism
We all slip and slide between the

objective and constructive views:
1. We live in a world of naïve realism.
2. But when we think about things, or

have to explain our views, we become
constructivists.
POSTMODERNISM
How Popular Culture Changes
as
RAYMOND WILLIAMS
 Dominant ideology controls
 Human agency: people work

together to bring about change
 Takes into account pluralism

of a culture
POSTSTRUCTURALISM
Acceptance of Pluralism
How Popular Culture Changes
Playboy Carrie in
Bunnies “Sex & The
City”
&
Samantha
June in “Sex &
Monica in
Cleaver The City”
“Friends”
Courtney
Love
Celebrating Diversity
PostModernism
 THE HOPE OF POSTMODERNISTS:
 The deconstruction of foundational views

will lead to a recognition and acceptance
of a pluralistic worldview.
 Create a truly global civilization.
POSTMODERNISM
Celebrating Diversity
Literary & FilmTheory

 Different constructs of reality
 “Lenses” through which we see the world

?
POSTMODERNISM

Postmodernism

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Introduction to

2. Why should we care about it?

3. Have you received a modern or postmodern education?

4. What does postmodernism have to say about your identity?

5. What does postmodernism have to say about truth, beauty,

6. How postmodernism is impacting K-12 education, religion, the

Evolution of Western Thought

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

RENAISSANCE TO ABOUT 1900 (+/- 30 years)

 The world according to white Anglo-Saxon males from Europe

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Your Place in History

14th C 1900 2000

You are here

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Your Place in History

Your teachers were / are here

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

 God, reason and progress

 There was a center to the universe.

 Progress is based upon knowledge, and man is

 Modernism is linked to capitalism—progressive

 Modernization of 3rd world countries (imposition

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Language & Truth

 There are universal laws and truths

 Knowledge is objective, independent of

 Language is a man-made tool that refers to

 I, the subject, speak language

 I have a discernible self

 The self is the center of existence

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Liberal Humanism: View of Literature

 Good literature is of timeless significance.

 The text will reveal constants, universal truths,

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

 Worldwide poverty & exploitation

 Worldwide poverty & exploitation

 Marx: class struggle

 Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Neitzsche

 Picasso, Stravinsky, Kafka, Proust,

 Einstein: relativity, quantum mechanics

 Refutation of Newtonian science

 Matter and energy are one

 Light as both particle and wave

E=mc2  Universe is strange

“Things fall apart,

--Yeats, “The Second Coming”

 Movement away from “objective” third-party

 Tendency toward reflexivity and self-

 Obsession with the psychology of self

 Rejection of traditional aesthetic theories

 Experimentation with language

 Continuation of modernist view

 Does not mourn loss of history, self, religion,

 A term applied to all human sciences —

 Reaction to modernism; systematic skepticism

 The Enlightenment project is dead.

 Modernism and postmodernism are cultural formations that

1. Market capitalism: 18th-19th C.

2. Monopoly capitalism: Late 19th C to WWII

Postmodernism: Basic Concepts

 Rejection of all master narratives

 All “truths” are contingent cultural constructs