Postmodernism

BAUDRILLARD
Jean Baudrillard (27 July 1929 – 6 March 2007)  was a French sociologist, philosopher, cultural theorist, political commentator, and photographer. His work is frequently associated with postmodernism and specifically post-structuralism.

Baudrillard was a social theorist and critic best known for his analyses of the modes of mediation and technological communication. His writing, though mostly concerned with the way technological progress affects social change, covers diverse subjects  — including consumerism, gender relations, the social understanding of history, journalistic commentaries about AIDS, cloning, the Rushdie affair, the first Gulf War, and the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City.

In common with many poststructuralists, his arguments consistently draw upon the notion that signification and meaning are both only understandable in terms of how particular words or "signs" interrelate. Baudrillard thought, as do many post-structuralists, that meaning is brought about through systems of signs working together.

Baudrillard argued that meaning (value) is created through difference - through what something is not (so "dog" means "dog" because it is not-"cat", not-"goat", not-"tree", etc.). In fact, he viewed meaning as near enough self-referential: objects, images of objects, words and signs are situated in a web of meaning; one object's meaning is only understandable through its relation to the meaning of other objects; in other words, one thing's prestige relates to another's mundanity.

From this starting point Baudrillard constructed broad theories of human society based upon this kind of self-referentiality. His pictures of society portray societies always searching for a sense of meaning  — or a "total" understanding of the world  — that remains consistently elusive.

SELF-REFERENTIALITY: Referring to oneself or itself:













JAMESON
Fredric Jameson  is an American literary critic and Marxist political theorist. He is best known for his analysis of contemporary cultural trend he once described postmodernism as the spatialization of culture under the pressure of organized capitalism. Jameson's best-known books include Postmodernism: The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, The Political Unconscious, and Marxism and Form.

Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism" was initially published in the journal New Left Review in 1984, during Jameson's tenure as Professor of Literature and History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz. This controversial article, which would later be expanded to a full-sized book in 1991, was part of a series of analyses of postmodernism from the dialectical point of view Jameson had developed in his earlier work on narrative. Jameson here viewed the postmodern "skepticism towards metanarratives" as a "mode of experience" stemming from the conditions of intellectual labor imposed by the late capitalist mode of production.




2. What’s new about postmodernism?

2. The difference between postmodern media and traditional media. What are the arguments for and against understanding some forms of media as post-modern.

Key Document 2

Document on the History and emergence of postmodern ideas.

Notes on Steven Connor’s outline of the development of postmodern ideas.

Some notes on the differences between modernism and postmodernism.

Possible Essay Question: What is the difference between postmodern media and traditional media.

- postmodern texts tend to dispense with traditional narrative forms. They challenge the convention of beginning-middle-end.

- postmodern texts tend to avoid conventional limitations of time/space

- self-reflexiveness….postmodern texts draw attention to their own making and to their fictional nature. Conventional media texts disguise their own making and encourage audiences to suspend their disbelief

- intertextuality/bricolage make postmodern texts much less self-contained, ie they refer to and borrow from other texts. Traditional media is much more self-contained.

- Traditonal media texts are ultimately about conveying meaning, whereas postmodern texts deny the possibility of meaning or truth.

Possible Essay Question: How do postmodern texts challenge the concept of representation? How does postmodernism challenge the notion that texts can represent reality?

Here’s a presentation that I found…

Modernism And Postmodernism

View more presentations from Rob McMinn

What modernist ideas has postmodernism challenged?

The word ‘postmodern’ requires us to consider, briefly, what is meant by modernism. Modernism is a term applied to various movements in art and culture at the end of the C19th and in the first half of the C20th. Much as there is not a single definition of postmodernism, it is impossible to define a single, coherent set of ideas to which we can attach the name modernism. Wikipedia suggests that ‘The term encompasses the activities and output of those who felt the “traditional” forms of art, architecture, literature, religious faith, social organization and daily life were becoming outdated in the new economic, social and political conditions of an emerging fully industrialized world.’

For our purposes, the most relevant thing to remember is that modernist artists and writers experimented with the representation of reality.

By comparison, in postmodernism, ‘the idea of representation gets ‘remixed’, played around with, through pastiche, parody and intertextual references – where the people that make texts deliberately expose their nature as constructed texts and make no attempt to pretend that they are ‘realist’.’ (JM, 137)

Postmodernism also reacts against modernism’s optimistic belief in the benefits of science and technology.

Much modernist work was seen as difficult, elitist and very much belonging to the world of ‘High Art’ and dismissive of ‘Low Art’.
By comparison, postmodernism, in its deliberate counter-culture positioning and its embrace of popular/low culture, challenges
modernism’s hostility towards mass culture

Analysis of Lady Gaga Telephone

• Intertextual reference to the film 'Kill Bill' because of the car being similar and called 'Pussy Wagon', which is also considered a postmodern film.
• Lady Gaga is very conscious in how she looks, so each outfit she wears has to be different and more unique than the last; so for her appearance is everything.
• Narrative based and containing hybrid themes.
• There is reference to her genitalia, because it was rumoured that she was a hermaphrodite, however this music video but that story to rest: "I told you she didn't have a d**k." ~ "Too bad.".
• There is also slight advertising, because the hair-rollers she was wearing, whilst in prison, are coca-cola cans
• It also covers issues of sexuality and makes predictable stereotypes that women in jail are lesbians, and it used dark humour with modern technology of the prison officer on a lesbian dating website, and her login is "Miss Officer".
• Lady Gaga and Beyonce break the forth wall and look directly at the viewer, especially with important lines (that are spoken and are not lyrics to the song) : "You know what they say, once you killed a cow you gotta make a burger.". Also she looked directly at the viewer when making important hand gestures.

Paparazzi analysis

Pastiche: video has generic conventions of a Hollywood 'Golden age film' of which Lady Gaga is the leadig lady

Intertextual references: there are many intertextual references made in the video. Gaga also 'blurs the boundaries when she is depicted as a humanoid.

Reference to popular culture: Gaga makes reference to popular cukture when she is depicted in the yellow outfit with the round mouse ears like Walt Disneys MinnieMouse.

Homage: The video makes reference to the alfred hitchcock film 'Vertigo@

Hypereality: There is blurring of fiction and reality in the film.

 

 

 

Assess the arguments for and against postmodernism in relation to your case studies.

Postmodernism is a theory that literally means: ‘after modernism.’ Some people believe that postmodernism came as a response to modernism, and consider them ass two aspects of the same movement. Postmodernism is a general wide ranging term which is applied to literature, art, philosophy, architecture, and media. Postmodern media relies upon conventions such as: Bricolage, pastiche, Intertextuality, and hyper reality to make it postmodern. Throughout this essay I will be assessing the argument for and against postmodern media, discussing my case studies: Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982) Scream (Wes Craven, 1996) and Family Guy (Seth McFarland).

Both modernism and postmodernism are considered ‘formalist’ in the sense that they are both concerned as much with how a story is told as the story itself. Both modern and postmodern media feature: fragmentation, self referentiality, irony, doubling and pastiche.

Postmodernism unlike modernism starts from the assumption that grand utopias are impossible. It accepts that reality is fragmented and that personal identity is an unstable quantity transmitted by a variety of cultural factors. For example Blade Runner depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in 2019 in which genetically engineered robots called ‘replicants’ are manufactured by the powerful ‘Tyrell Corporation’ This makes it a postmodern film in the sense that it both represents the conditions of post modernity and employs elements of the postmodern condition to texture its narrative. Blade Runner explores and utilises the use of blurring because the film mixes genres and time periods together as well as the use if intertextual references, quotation, pastiche, recycling, hyper reality and identity crisis. These elements are an argument for post modernity as they are playful and curious, and elements such as Intertextuality create and intelligent audience   who gain a different understanding   of the film from having prior knowledge of the media it’s referencing.

In postmodern media, there is no reality, there are only perceptions or copies of reality (simulacra) at worst, postmodernism can be detached, nihilistic, sexist, despairing homophobic and even racist. An example of this and a clear argument against post modernity and postmodern media, is the episode of Family Guy in which God is shown in a bar attempting to talk to and seduce a woman. This is a typically postmodern scene in the sense that it is playful and curious; however it is quite disrespectful towards religion and possibly considered offensive by some followers of religion.

Another argument for postmodernism is the cleverness of the narratives by the use of double-coding or doubling. Double-coding is the practice of creating a work of art or piece of media that speaks to two different audiences in different ways. An example of this is the way in which the films Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995) and Shrek (DreamWorks, 2001) are double coded, they are essentially children’s films, yet include many intertextual references and jokes that a child would not understand fully, but that would amuse an adult.

In conclusion, postmodernism is; open self referential, self-conscious, and ironic. The subjective nature of post modernity often makes it difficult to form arguments for and against it because it can have many definitions depending on what is being discussed. Ultimately there are many elements of postmodern media that can both be a positive and a negative such as Intertextuality which is very positive if the audience are aware of the media that is being referenced, but if they are not it leaves them not understanding.