Introduction to Postmodernism & Contemporary Literary Theory

Introduction to Postmodernism & Contemporary Literary Theory
SOUND BORING?

Agenda POSTMODERNISM LITERARY THEORY New Criticism Structuralism
Archetypal / myth criticism Marxist / ideological Psychoanalytical Poststructuralism Deconstruction theory Cultural materialism Feminism Queer theory Postcolonialism BRIEF SUBNAIL DISCUSSIONS OF THE MAJOR SCHOOLS OF THOUGHTS AND LEADING THINKERS VERY TOP LEVEL It’s about more than finding meaning in a text Current theories of language, knowledge and the self Reflects a recent revolution in the humanities A complete overhauling of long-accepted Western assumptions and biases Literature is power To help you become citizens of the postmodern world THESE ARE THEORIES OF READINGS A FEMINIST READING A DECONSTRUCTIVIST READING

Why Reality Isn’t What It Used to Be
Perhaps you might prefer this title

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 is postmodernism is impacting K-12 education, religion, the arts, and our daily lives? 7. How are postmodern scholars trying to change the way we “understand” contemporary literature and film? WHAT I HOPE TO COVER Why study it in the first place? Put the subject in context History of modernity Modern vs postmodernism How literary theory

TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING
Newtonian Order Modernity The Renaissance and Enlightenment “project” of Western civilization 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) TO UNDERSTAND POSTMODERNISM, FIRST NEED TO UNDERSTAND WHAT IS MEANT MY MODERNITY AND MODERNISM WHAT IS MODERNITY? BASIC PRINCIPLES TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Western Humanist View of Language
What Is Language? Western Humanist View of Language 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 THIS PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE SUGGESTED A PHILSOPHY OF LANGUAGE AND HOW WE VIEW OURSELVES TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Western Humanist View of Literature
Purpose of Literature Western Humanist View of Literature Good literature is of timeless significance. A literary work is "sincere," meaning it is honest, true to experience and human nature, and thus can speak the truth about the human condition. The literary text contains its own meaning within itself. And this is THE CLASS MODERN VIEW OF LITERATURE LITERATURE IS UNIVERSAL TRUTHS The best way to study the text is to study the words on the page, without any predefined agenda for what one wants to find there. The text will reveal constants, universal truths, about human nature, because human nature itself is constant and unchanging. TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Evolution of Western Thought
as Timeline Evolution of Western Thought Naturalistic Theocentric Economic Humanistic YOU CAN LOOK AT THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION INTO FOUR ERAS THEOCENTRIC--Hamlet tells us "There is a Divinity that shapes our ends...” Western art. HUMANISTIC--"Man is the measure of all things." We chart our own destiny. NATURALISTIC--We are shaped by our environment, for the good or bad. Darwinian influence of survival of the fittest. ECONOMIC--Social power lies in money and weath. As Marx said, history is the story of class struggles in which the 'have-nots' struggle to dispossess the 'haves' who naturally will fight to keep what they own. Those who have economic power control cultures, language and shape us as consumers. 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 “Modernity" is older than "modernism;" the label "modern," first articulated in nineteenth-century sociology, was meant to distinguish the present era from the previous one, which was labeled "antiquity." Scholars are always debating when exactly the "modern" period began, and how to distinguish between what is modern and what is not modern; it seems like the modern period starts earlier and earlier every time historians look at it. But generally, the "modern" era is associated with the European Enlightenment, which begins roughly in the middle of the eighteenth century. (Other historians trace elements of enlightenment thought back to the Renaissance or earlier, and one could argue that Enlightenment thinking begins with the eighteenth century. BAUDRILLARD TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Timeline Your Place in History 14th C Modern Modernism Postmodernism ACTUALLY, WHEN TALKING ABOUT THE HISTORY OF WESTERN INTELLECTUALISM AND ART, YOU NEED TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN three ERAs: MODERN MODERNISM OR MODERNIST POSTMODERN You are in the midst of this revolution WHERE MOD AND POMO BEGINS AND ENDS IS FUZZY You are here TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Timeline Your Place in History as 14th C Modern Modernism Postmodernism A lot of people ARE LIVING AND FUNCTIONALLY PERFECTLY WELL IN THE POSTMODERN WORLD AND THEY ARE COMPLETELY UNAWARE OF THE FACT WE DID NOT STUDY ANY OF THIS IN 1970S TEACHERS EDUCATED AS MODERNISTS UNAWARE WE ARE IN THE MIDDLE YOUR GENERATION CLEARLY IS Your teachers were / are here TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING
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 THERE WAS INTELLECTUAL UPHEAVAL IN THE EARLY 1900s Sigmund Freud's view of the unconscious as the determinant of motivation and behavior Karl Marx's view of consciousness as a product of sociohistorical factors Friedrich Nietzsche's annunciation of the death of God Devastation of the war, modernism embodies a lack of faith in Western civilization and culture -- its humanism and rationalism. Picasso, Kafka, Joyce, Dadaism and surrealis, existentialism, search for meaning Rise of fascism, anarchy, nihilism Rebellion against liberal humanism, positivism, reason, progress, god-centric world PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

Relativism E=mc2 Einstein: relativity, quantum mechanics
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 Universe is strange Revolution in science AT THE SAME TIME Bend the rules of science Observer’s position effects interpretation of reality E=mc2 PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM TRADITIONAL WESTERN “MODERN” THINKING

PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM
Breaking the Rules Modernist Art Cubism Surrealism Dadaism Expressionism Different ways of depicting reality Fragmentation of reality BUT STILL A BELIEF IN AN OBJECTIVE REALITY (for the most part) IN THE WORLD OF ART, THE REVOLT AGAINST MODERN RATIONAL THINKING BECAME VERY EVIDENT REVOLT AGAINST REPRESENTIONAL ART Antiprepresentational "Modernism can be thought of as the self-conscious response in the arts to the experience of modernity "a radically altered aesthetic form and perspective: the modernist stress upon art as a self-referential construct instead of as a mirror of nature or society" Cubism--different perspectives of reality PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Breaking the Rules Modernist Art Cubism Surrealism Dadaism Expressionism SURREALISM STRANGE DREAMLIKE JUXTAPOSITIONS OF IMAGES PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Breaking the Rules Modernist Art Cubism Surrealism Dadaism Expressionism MAGRITTE AND SALVADOR DALI PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Breaking the Rules Modernist Art Cubism Surrealism Dadaism Expressionism RADICAL NEW WAYS OF SEEING AND EXPRESSING REALITY MIRO AND CHAGALL PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

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” In literature, POETS, NOVELISTS AND PLAYWRIGHTS BECAME TO PROCLAIM THE END OF THE RATIONAL WORLD EXISTENTIAL THEMES BEGAN TO APPEAR LIFE WITH NO CENTER YEATS LANDMARK POEM THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS WAS AWORLD WITH NO CENTER PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

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 In writers such as HEMINGWAY, FAULKNER, VIRGINIA WOOLF, FROST AND JAMES JOYCE, existential themes bgean to appear WHOLE DIFFERENT TYPE OF LITERATURE MIRRORED WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN VISUAL ARTS Exploration of man as an alienated individual, inward looking Focus on impressionism, and subjectivity Movement away from tradition 3rd party ways of story telling Self consciousness bred a new style called stream of consciousness Spontaneity and discovery in creation Experimentation Still reflected western tradition Eliot--rich language and symbols of experience The Lost Generation--Gertrude Stein, Fitzgerald PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Acceptance of a New Age What is Postmodernism? A term applied to all human sciences — anthropology, psychology, architecture, history, etc. Anti-foundational, anti-reason, anti-progress No “center” to the world THAT IS THE MODERNIST VIEW OF THE WORLD LESS REALISM AND NATURALISTIC INTERPRETATION EMPHASIS ON THE SUBCONSCIOUSNESS EXPERIMENTATION IN AESTHETICS HOW DOES POSMODERNISM DIFFER? Not opposite to--an extension of BULLETS POSTMODERNISM

Postmodernism: Basic Concepts
The End of Master Narratives Postmodernism: Basic Concepts 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 Life just is THESE ARE SOME BASIC CONCEPTS THAT CUT ACROSS ALL ASPECTS OF POSTMODERNISM On objective essence, no central truths Don’t mourn or worry about it--that’s just the way life is BULLETS POSTMODERNISM

The End of Master Narratives Postmodernism: Basic Concepts All versions of reality are SOCIAL CONSTRUCTS Concepts of good and evil Metaphors for God Language The self Gender EVERYTHING! Even marriage Islam Mormons of the 19th c Chinese concubines Family Motherhood Plato China one-child India--girls are bad 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

Modernity PostModern History as fact Faith in social order
One vs. Many Modernity PostModern History as fact Faith in social order Family as central unit Authenticity of originals Mass consumption Written by the victors Cultural pluralism Alternate families Hyper-reality (MTV) Niches; small group identity The encyclopedia Web Architecture of NY LA and Vegas Phallic order Queer sexual identities POSTMODERNISM

What is Postmodernism? Continuation of modernist view
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 THAT IS THE MODERNIST VIEW OF THE WORLD LESS REALISM AND NATURALISTIC INTERPRETATION EMPHASIS ON THE SUBCONSCIOUSNESS EXPERIMENTATION IN AESTHETICS HOW DOES POSMODERNISM DIFFER? Not opposite to--an extension of BULLETS POSTMODERNISM

What is Postmodernism? The Enlightenment project is dead.
Acceptance of a New Age What is Postmodernism? The Enlightenment project is dead. THAT IS THE MODERNIST VIEW OF THE WORLD LESS REALISM AND NATURALISTIC INTERPRETATION EMPHASIS ON THE SUBCONSCIOUSNESS EXPERIMENTATION IN AESTHETICS HOW DOES POSMODERNISM DIFFER? Not opposite to--an extension of BULLETS 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 ANOTHER WAY OF LOOKING AT IT JAMESON OFTEN GIVEN CREIDT FOR POPULARIZING PM AN AMERICAN MARXIST--NOT IN POLITICAL BUT LITERARY SENSE CULTURAL MATERIALIST ECONOMICS DICTATE REALITY 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 THESE ARE SOME BASIC CONCEPTS THAT CUT ACROSS ALL ASPECTS OF POSTMODERNISM On objective essence, no central truths Don’t mourn or worry about it--that’s just the way life is BULLETS POSTMODERNISM

The End of Master Narratives Postmodernism: Basic Concepts All versions of reality are SOCIAL CONSTRUCTS Concepts of good and evil Metaphors for God Language The self Gender EVERYTHING! Even marriage Islam Mormons of the 19th c Chinese concubines Family Motherhood Plato China one-child India--girls are bad POSTMODERNISM

Language As Social Construct Postmodernism: Basic Concepts 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 THIS VIEW OF THE WORLD HAS A BIG IMPACT UPON KNOWLEDGE AND LANGUAGE THEORY HOW DO WE KNOW WHAT WE KNOW? HOW DOES LANGUAGE MEAN? HERE ARE SOME KEY PRINCIPLES: BULLETS POSTMODERNISM CHANGES EVERYTHING VIEW OF THEOLOGY PSYCHOLOGY MILITARY 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 Richard Rorty is often cited as the most prominent philosophical defender of postmodernism. AMERICAN--Stanford university He insists that there is no "skyhook" which takes us out of our subjective conditions to reveal a reality existing independently of our own minds or of other human minds.{2} Each person interprets reality in accordance with his own subjective condition. But Rorty does not argue for an individualistic free-for-all notion of truth. He emphasizes the social influence upon the individual and his beliefs. Truth, or what for Rorty substitutes for it, is an intersubjective agreement among the members of a community.{4} That intersubjective agreement permits the members of the community to speak a common language and establish a commonly accepted reality. The end of inquiry, for Rorty, is not the discovery or even the approximation of absolute truth but the formulation of beliefs that further the solidarity of the community, or "to reduce objectivity to solidarity."{ He argues that once the notion of objective truth is abandoned, one must choose between a self-defeating relativism and ethnocentrism, neither of which can be justified in a manner that is not circular. He responds that one "should grasp the ethnocentric horn of the dilemma" and "privilege our own group."{6} As far as any new beliefs that we are to consider, they must at least roughly cohere with those already held by the community, or, as Rorty puts the point, "We want to be able to justify ourselves to our earlier selves. This preference is not built into us by human nature. It is just the way we live now."{7} Read slowly POSTMODERNISM

Postmodern View of Language
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 HERE ARE SOME OF THE UNDERLYING ASSUMPTIONS OF PM THEORY ABOUT LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE--ALSO APPLIES TO HISTORY AND PSYCHOLOGY POSTMODERNISM

PostModern Literature
Play and Parody PostModern Literature Extreme freedom of form and expression Repudiation of boundaries of narration & genre Self-reflexive (“this is only a work of art”) Intrusive 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 WHICH BRINGS US TO POSTMODERNIST LITERATURE? HAVE YOU READ VONNEGUT? BARTH? PYNCHEON? ATWOOD? Experiments with modes to create a stream of consciousness so vivid that the author disappears Experimented within traditional frameworks POSTMODERNIST Challenged the traditional narrative and genre boundaries Creates ruptures, gaps and ironies that continue to remind the reader that the author is present See traditional linear representatives of reality false Challenge structures and taboos of contemporary society SEE THE WORKINGS But Quixote self-reflective Many current novels very traditional POSTMODERNISM

PostModern Literature
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 Mixed techniques--essay--newsreals (Dos Passsos), memos,, etc. Kundera Pycheon: Gravity’s rainbow: ambiguous unresolvable allegory Conspiracy and paranoia are common themes, biting social critique (Kurt V) Workings of the machine are visible BARTH, BRAUTIGAN, BURROUGHS, DOCTOROW, ECO, HELLER, GASS, MAILER, MORRISON, OATES, PYNCHON, ROTH, GAO, KUNDERA POSTMODERNISM

Modernity PostModern History as fact Faith in social order
Binary Oppositions Modernity PostModern History as fact Faith in social order Family as central unit Authenticity of originals Broadway musicals Mass consumption Hierarchy between high and low cultures Written by the victors Cultural pluralism Alternate families Hyper-reality (simulacrum) Music videos Niches; small group identity Mixing of high and low; disruption of high by pop culture The encyclopedia Web Architecture of NY LA and Vegas Phallic order Queer sexual identities POSTMODERNISM

Modernity PostModern Belief in real, lasting truths
Binary Oppositions Modernity PostModern Belief in real, lasting truths Seriousness of intention; middle-class earnestness Red Skelton New York skyline Moral boundaries in art Truth contingent and localized; books as marketed products; whoever is hot at the moment Irony; challenge to anything serious Jon Stewart Las Vegas Anything goes The encyclopedia Web Architecture of NY LA and Vegas Phallic order Queer sexual identities POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM
He deliberately confuses the audience with the fragmentation of the narrative. Its four narratives overlap, the characters wandering between them. The creating of the story in our minds on the basis of the cues in the plot becomes an intellectual "pleasure of bliss" Intertextual--allusions to Hitchcock, etc. Using art house devices and mixing them with trivial elements Tarantino's postmodern Pulp Fiction mixes low and high levels. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERN Breathless Natural Born Killers
Blue Velvet Pulp Fiction Blade Runner The Matrix Moulin Rouge POST-POSTMODERN (Post-Punk) American Beauty Being John Malkovich Magnolia Memento Fight Club He deliberately confuses the audience with the fragmentation of the narrative. Its four narratives overlap, the characters wandering between them. The creating of the story in our minds on the basis of the cues in the plot becomes an intellectual "pleasure of bliss" Intertextual--allusions to Hitchcock, etc. Using art house devices and mixing them with trivial elements Tarantino's postmodern Pulp Fiction mixes low and high levels. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERN Cynicism Irony
Playful deconstruction of the rules Mixing of real and hyper- real No sincere attachment to characters Story not important POST-POSTMODERN (Post-Punk) Visually radical, but... Nostalgic for some mythic, uncomplicated, preconsumer culture movement A new sincerity Postmodern metaphors of self- reference, irony, sumulation absorbed into American culture Narrative matters Nicholas Rombes He deliberately confuses the audience with the fragmentation of the narrative. Its four narratives overlap, the characters wandering between them. The creating of the story in our minds on the basis of the cues in the plot becomes an intellectual "pleasure of bliss" Intertextual--allusions to Hitchcock, etc. Using art house devices and mixing them with trivial elements Tarantino's postmodern Pulp Fiction mixes low and high levels. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERN
Retro-styles; homage to classic films and directors Mixing and reinterpreting the old and the new Playing with old myths and old stories (nothing new) Characters occupy different worlds at the same time E.g., Blue Velvet, Run Lola Run, Brazil, Blade Runner Mixture of truth and fiction (e.g., JFK) He deliberately confuses the audience with the fragmentation of the narrative. Its four narratives overlap, the characters wandering between them. The creating of the story in our minds on the basis of the cues in the plot becomes an intellectual "pleasure of bliss" Intertextual--allusions to Hitchcock, etc. Using art house devices and mixing them with trivial elements Tarantino's postmodern Pulp Fiction mixes low and high levels. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERN POP CULTURE Homer Simpson Hip Hop
Civil unions Diversity training Casual wear in formal places Body piercing He deliberately confuses the audience with the fragmentation of the narrative. Its four narratives overlap, the characters wandering between them. The creating of the story in our minds on the basis of the cues in the plot becomes an intellectual "pleasure of bliss" Intertextual--allusions to Hitchcock, etc. Using art house devices and mixing them with trivial elements Tarantino's postmodern Pulp Fiction mixes low and high levels. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? A gay Southern Baptist who practices Buddhist meditation and believes in the Big Bang theory. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM Lake Shore apartments in Chicago
Built in changed the look of every American citY Originally, the term comes from architecture, where modern architecture denotes the familiar glass, steel and concrete buildings with their straight, rectangular, geometric shapes. This led in the 1960's to a reaction by younger architects, who included different decorative elements inspired by earlier periods in their design. This eclectic mixture of styles was called "postmodern architecture". From there the term "postmodern" quickly spread to art, where it denoted a departure from the radicalism and abstraction of the old avant-garde, replacing them by a fusion of different popular and traditional elements, like Warhol's Pop Art or rock music incorporating African and oriental motives. POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM Simplicity
Form should follow function Le Corbusier church Expressionist modern POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? Art Museum in Paris Le Boo Boo POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? Frank Gehring /Prague POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM Cubism
New way of looking at reality POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? POSTMODERNISM American Robert Rauschenberg
Throws into question idea of creativity and originality Silk-screen canvases and montages Fragments From production to reproduction ART DISPENSES WITH AURA ANDY WARHOL AS WELL Frank plagarism, repetition of existing images POSTMODERNISM

Modern or Postmodern? Reality as entertainment 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 Andy Warhol Body Piercings Boy George Annie Sprinkle MTV Videos Madonna Gus Gus Rap Levi's Commercials The X Files Blade Runner Frankenhooker Jerry Springer Real World Cops Bill Clinton on MTV Body modification The Web Salon Cyberpunk Affinity group credit cards Arugala salads with duck meat, goat cheese and pine nuts POSTMODERNISM

A Global Battle: THE OBJECTIVISTS vs. THE CONSTRUCTIVISTS
Battle of World Views PostModernism A Global Battle: THE OBJECTIVISTS vs THE CONSTRUCTIVISTS TAKES ON POLITICAL OVERTONES OBJECTIVIST ONE WORLD VIEW THIS IS THE WAY THE WORLD IS CONSTRUCTIVISTS THE REAL WORLD IS AN EVER CHANGING SOCIAL CREATION POSTMODERNISM

PostModernism OBJECTIVISTS My Way
“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. THIS IS POWERFUL STUFF NOT ACADEMIC BABBLE Galileo Spanish Inquisitions McCarthy with hunts Dissenters during Prague Spring China Tianamen Square Taliban POSTMODERNISM

God is Not Dead PostModernism Our public schools have become a postmodern battleground. SCHOOLS are in the social construction of reality business Postmodern thinking has brought radical changes--some good, some bad How history is taught Columbus, Jefferson, Kennedy Revisionist history Warts and all Multiple cultures and perspectives VALUES Who’s values--everyone’s? dilute standards and values Secular humanists or fundamentalists? Minority sets the standards Basic purpose of education--help people get a job, liberal education, good citizens of US, moral and values OBE, and condoms--OBE’s big business calling the shots--good employees OBE vague goals--competent world citizen--Skinner conditioning Send your children to Bob Jones U, BYU, Grove City, Duquesne or Berkleley POSTMODERNISM

God is Not Dead PostModernism You can be a Christian (or Buddhist, or Hindu, etc.) in the postmodern world. All I am saying is that our society is no longer White Christian Male centric 1950s Ten Commandments in school Women knew their place in the home Hindus, Blacks, Gays were others Communists were evil Sex not talked about or exploited What was good for GM was good for America Now Still be Christian But recognize that there are other world views IN FACT--NEVER HAVE BEEN MORE RELIGIONS AND CULTS POSTMODERNISM HAS GIVEN RISE TO MORE CHRISTIAN DENOMINATIONS, EASTERN ORIENTED FAITHS, NEW AGE, SHAMANISM, DRUIDS, SATANISM, CULTS--PEOPLE ARE FRAGMENTED SEARCHING FOR MEANING--RESULT OF NO CENTER TO THE WORLD CHALLENGE TO CATHOLIC CHURCH--ABSOLUTISTS AND THOSE VIEW CATHOLICISM AS A CAFETERIA--POSTMODERN CHALLENGES 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. Assume that the world is the way we experience it. MOST US ARE UNFORMED CITIZENS OF THE POSTMODERN WORLD CONFUSED, UNLEAR OF OUR OWN CENTERS WANT THE GOOD OLD DAYS CREATED POLARIZATION--RELIGIOUS RIGHT, WHITE SUPREMACIST, ISLAMIC EXTREMISTS--PEOPLE WHO CANNOT DEAL WITH THE POST MODERN WORLD We accept social rules of the group--go along with them--accept external reality. We 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 Dominant: the prevailing meaning of a cultural text or practice. This is the assumed or taken-for-granted meaning that best serves the status quo of society Alternative: meanings outside the strict boundaries of the dominant mode. They are different but do not upset the status quo. Therefore they are tolerated and can be accommodated without much trouble Oppositional: meanings completely outside the boundaries of the dominant mode that directly contradict and threaten to destabilize the status quo Residual: meanings that rely on a sense of how things used to be in the past. They justify themselves based on a real or perceived sense of how we lived once upon a time Emergent: new meanings that have not yet been incorporated into the dominant but may in time prove to become to new dominant sensibility. They could also shift to become alternative or oppositional Although we may tend to associate residual with traditional/conservative and emergent with progressive/modern, that is not always necessarily the case. Similarly, alternative and oppositional meanings c POSTSTRUCTURALISM

How Popular Culture Changes
Acceptance of Pluralism How Popular Culture Changes Playboy Bunnies & June Cleaver Carrie in “Sex & The City” Samantha in “Sex & The City” Monica in “Friends” NOT SOCIAL UPHEAVAL NOT ONE CAMP VERSUS ANOTHER ALWAYS A DOMINANT IDEOLOGY OR TREND WE ACCEPT PLULARISM THERE ARE ALWAYS DOMINANT RESIDUAL ALTERNATIVE OPPOSITIONAL EMERGENT OFTEN THE ALTERNATIVE OR OPPOSTION BECOMES THE DOMINANT OR MERGES WITH THE DOMINANT THE 60S’S--the HIPPIES DID NOT WIN-- WE ARE NOTall smoking pot to day or living in communes--but many of their ideas, music, attitudes toward the sexes, political views--BECAME MAINSTREAM 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. The forces of postmodernism will prevent will ultimately defeat any power trying to corral people into a single world view. Afghanistan POSTMODERNISM

PostModernism DOOM-SAYERS: A Godless world. Late capitalism will lead to the complete digitization of hyper-reality; no hope for an alienated, fragmented world duped by the machinations of a commodity culture We become simulacra; the cloned robots win. The forces of postmodernism will prevent will ultimately defeat any power trying to corral people into a single world view. Afghanistan POSTMODERNISM

Literary Theory

Universality vs. localism
Modernity PostModern Literature as expression of universal truths contained in archetypal metaphors Literature as an ideological expression of local, culturally constructed “truths” that are highly fluid and dependent on the reader’s perspective in time and place The encyclopedia Web Architecture of NY LA and Vegas Phallic order Queer sexual identities POSTMODERNISM

Universality vs. localism
Modernity PostModern Art is representational Language and imagery can be used to evoke the “real” Metaphysics of presence (I, the speaker, am present and impose order on the universe; presence or being is central to all systems of thought) Language is a system of relations from which the referent is absent Signification without representation I am just a part of the signifying system of language; language speaks me The encyclopedia Web Architecture of NY LA and Vegas Phallic order Queer sexual identities POSTMODERNISM

So What? The white-Western-male view of the world is dead
Now What? So What? The white-Western-male view of the world is dead Truth, identity, gender, etc. are social constructs, contingent and local It’s all relative and pluralistic Anything goes? White western male--at least reduced to only one of many possibilities The white Western male view of the world is dead New Criticism & Structuralism are flawed We now have a new set of “lenses” to view the world We understand the importance of being suspicious (literature is not necessarily sincere) Hidden texts, ideologies, gender bias, philo. Bia wary of grand narratives--K&K--know it alls We recognize that truth, identity, gender, etc. are social constructs, contingent and local We recognize the power of discourse How we are all shaped by language, pop culture, advertising, education, films, TV, music POSTSTRUCTURALISM

The Dangers of Postmodernism
Proceed with Caution The Dangers of Postmodernism Can lead to intellectual nihilism & cynicism From the comfortable foundation of humanism to absolute relativism and pluralism Is humanism really all that bad? It’s all theory How do we use theory? Apply all to all texts? Glib, hip intellectualism WHY ONLY THESE THEORIES? POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Proceed with Caution Where Do We Go from Here? Has the progress of history come to a dead-end? (as Foucault and Lyotard suggest) Have we reached the point of self-defeating moral relativism? Jameson: We need narratives, and some sort of history We need to re-endow the individual History, literature have important functions Sarup: We need to keep the Enlightenment project alive WHY ONLY THESE THEORIES? POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Literary Theory THE AUTHOR Three Perspectives Author is king
Need to understand the author’s life The world in which he lived His pronouncements about his intent Letters and correspondence

Literary Theory THE AUTHOR THE TEXT Three Perspectives
The text is sacred Meaning is in the text Author may not have achieved what he intended Work is the result of his subconscious More there than he realizes LANGUAGE speaks the individual

Literary Theory THE AUTHOR THE TEXT THE READER Three Perspectives
Reader is king or at least a co-partner in the reader/writing process Produces meaning Every reader creates a new text with every reading Reader’s position in relation to the text Social class Time in history Very postmodern The importance of the observer situated in a specific time and place Interpretations of texts will change with time Just as our understanding of history Depends on the observor

Literary Theory Different constructs of reality “Lenses” through which we see the world ? The forces of postmodernism will prevent will ultimately defeat any power trying to corral people into a single world view. Afghanistan POSTMODERNISM

Ancient History Aristotle ( B.C.) as POETICS: Mimetic Theory (learn through example & representation) History represents the particular Poetry represents the universal Complete and unified action, beginning middle and end, short memorable stories Good plot: reversal of fortune Anagnorsis: recognition of an unknown truth Tragic mimesis: Great characters that evoke pity and fear Comedy: Flawed characters LITERARY THEORY IS AS OLD AS ARISTOTLE Purpose of literature was to teach Learn through example and representation Literature represents universal truths which could be captured Good literature must follow certain rules

The Sanctity of the Text
New Criticism as View literature as a valid form of knowledge and as a communicator of truths inaccessible via scientific and other discourse A work of literature has an organic structure Objective way of analyzing literature Author’s intentions are irrelevant FIRST MAJOR LITERARY THEORY MOVEMENT THAT GAINED ACCEPTANCE BY US ACAMEDICS WAS NEW CRITICISM TRIED TO ELEVATE THE STUDY OF LITERATURE TO THAT OF SCIENCE, AND USED OBJECTIVE SCIENTIFIC METHODS Work is as an object in itself View literature as a valid form of knowledge and as a communicator of truths inaccessible via scientific and other discourse Meaning within the imagery and symbolism of the self-contained work Author’s intentions are irrelevant A poem means what it means, independent of author or reader’s feelings Objective way of analyzing it Tensions, paradoxes, ambivalences, resolution; organic structure Words in literary text are slippery—never reducible to a final interpretation TEXTUAL THEORY

Ferdinand de Sausurre (1857-1913)
Structural Linguistics Ferdinand de Sausurre ( ) as Course in General Linguistics (1916) General structures by which language, myths and literatures work Language is a system of signs Individual units of a linguistic structure only have meaning in relationship to other units Meaning is in the structure not the content WHICH LEADS US TO THE STRUCTURALISTS STRUCTURALISM Basically, structuralism is about 'big structures' and people trying to explain human behaviour in terms of 'big systems' (like Marxism, Darwinism, Psychoanalysis, etc.). Deals with the study of self-contained systems of human creation. Structuralism's enterprise is to discover how people make sense of the world, not what the world is" (Fiske, 1990, p. 115). ALL HUMAN ACTIVITY IS STRUCTURED BY THE MIND--NUT NOT NATURAL OR ESSENTIAL FIRST TO LOOK AT LANGUAGE SCIENTIFICIALLY SEE LANGUAGE AS WHAT GIVES LIFE MEANING SAUSURRE--tired to understand the underlying structure of language STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER
Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word SIGNM FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word The bond between the two is arbitrary SIGNM FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre as Dog =/= Cat SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER
Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as May or may not exist; not important to structuralist; only how system of language gives order to what we perceive as reality SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word Dog =/= Cat FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre as Dog =/= Cat SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER
Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word Dog =/= Cat FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre as Freedom Dog =/= Cat SIGNIFIED Meaning
Signifier & Signified Ferdinand de Sausurre as SIGNIFIED Meaning SIGNIFIER Sound or written word Dog =/= Cat Freedom FOUNDATION OF ALL DISCUSSIONS AF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE BASED UPON HIM HERE ARE HIS BASIC CONCEPTS STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre Difference—the relation that creates value
Binary Oppositions Ferdinand de Sausurre Difference—the relation that creates value Binary oppositions—The idea of difference is based upon the concept of opposing binary pairs Day / night Male / female Goodness / evil Reason / madness Spiritual / earthly ? STRUCTURALISM

Ferdinand de Sausurre as LANGUAGE SPEAKS US Language Speaks Us
ALL MAKES SENSE MIGHT WONDER WHAT DOES IT REALLY MEAN? HOW APPLY TO LITERATURE? It is very theoretical Doesn’t make a lot of sense until you think through the implications Many psychologists, philosophers and literary theorists use SAUSSERE AS their starting point When you think through implications-- Signified--CAT OK, but words like words like good and evil God, truth, freedom, woman’s rights, power, identity, sex, guilt Things start to get interesting Structuralism suggests a nice tidy order based upon binary opposites STRUCTURALISM

Claude Levi-Strauss (1908-)
The Savage Mind Claude Levi-Strauss (1908-) as French anthropologist Took Saussure’s theories about language and applied them to the study of myth and culture Savage mind = civilized mind Man obeys laws that are inherent in the brain Myths are not made by an individual—but by the collective human consciousness Next major figure who built upon SAUSSURE Refused to see Western civilization as uniqu 30 years studying North and South American Indians STRUCTURALISM

The Grammar of Myth Claude Levi-Strauss Every culture organizes knowledge into binary pairs Different myths are all variations on a number of very basic themes A kind of grammar for narratives inherent in the human mind Certain constant universal structures called mythemes Structuralism decentralizes the individual (the subject) Meaning is not a private experience Product of certain shared systems of signification STRUCTURALISM

Claude Levi-Strauss LANGUAGE predates the individual
The Same Old Stories Claude Levi-Strauss LANGUAGE predates the individual REALITY is a product of language Jonah and Christ are the same story Thus all myths are timeless Hero needs to overcome an obstacle A story about a guy who loves a girl who is inaccessible Woman wants to make chicken soup has no chicken SAME STORY: incomplete/completeness STRUCTURALISM

Myths & Archetypes Archetypal as NORTHROP FRYE, Anatomy of Criticism (1957) Literature formed an objective system that could be analyzed “scientifically” Laws = archetypes, myths, genres are basic structures (universal patterns) Four narrative categories: Comic Spring Romantic Summer Tragic Autumn Ironic Winter ANOTHER TYPE OF THEORY called ARCHETYPAL OR GENRE MANY OF YOU FAMILIAR WITH IT YOUR TEACHERS TRAINED IN IT Frye was a Christian clergyman and humanist Like Arnold—literature source of spiritual uplifting and reform But, unlike NC, finds in literature a substitute history WE CAN FIND UNDERLYING PATTERNS AND STRUCTURES UNIVERSAL MIND, know truth and beauty and goodness Like New Criticism—literature of itself, untainted by history Literature not a collective way of knowing reality but a kind of collective utopian dreaming than has gone on throughout history Literary works are made from other literary works Frye views literature almost spiritually—unpolluted real history of man Mythoi—pre urban images of the natural cycles and nostalgic memories of a history before industrialism PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

The Universal Conscious
Archetypal as NORTHROP FRYE, Anatomy of Criticism (1957) All these patterns spring from the COLLECTIVE UNCONSCIOUS to reveal universal archetypes Myth Hero is superior Romance Superior in degree Tragedy and epic Superior in degree but not to others Comedy and realism Equal to rest of us Satire and irony Inferior STRUCTURALISM

Archetypal as NORTHROP FRYE, Anatomy of Criticism (1957)
Archetypal Genres Archetypal as NORTHROP FRYE, Anatomy of Criticism (1957) Tragedy About human isolation Comedy Human integration All literature passes from myth to irony and reverts to myth Can be viewed as a structuralist STRUCTURALISM

Hidden Structures Structuralism Reaction against fragmentation of Modernism The forces governing human behavior are hidden but detectable Search for underlying hidden structures Science: grand unifying theory Psychology Sociology Anthropology: universal archetypes Language ALSO GAVE RISE TO SOMETHING CALLED STRUCTURALISM THE DESIRE TO SEARCH FOR HIDDEN MEANINGS A FEW DIE-HARD INTELLECTUALS WANTED TO RESTORE ORDER AND FIND UNIVERSAL MEANINGS PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Language Creates Us Structuralism Language and culture produce subjects (the “I” is decentered) Binary oppositions Literature reflects universal psyche of the human mind 1. Language produces subject THERE IS AN UNCONSCIOUS INFRASTUCTURE WORDS AND SIGNS ARE NOT INDEPENDENT BUT CONNECTED TO A SYSTEM OF RELATIONS BETWEEN SIGNIFIERS AND MEANINGS STRUCTURALISM

PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM
Repressed Truths Sigmund Freud ( ) as KEY CONCEPTS: Id, Superego, Ego Resolution of Oedipus complex > the Self Repression Dreams: displacement and condensation (metaphor and metonomy) Neurosis and psychosis Transference LIMITATION: Freud talks about resolution of the Oedipus complex as something the individual achieves on his own. Mother--love Recognition of father which threatens the child which puts a stop to the Oedipus complex and projects child into real world Keep ego in check and id and superego under control Accepts ego as real The unconscious has a threatening aspect Goal to achieve harmony of ego NO MENTION OF SOCIETY PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

Language Is Us Jacques Lacan ( ) as Self and identity are social constructions. Our unconscious is just not inside us. It is formed by language which is outside us and constructs our sense of self. Language, our parents, the unconscious, the symbolic order represent the OTHER. FREUD--FOCUS ON INDIVIDUAL PSYCHE & FAMILY LACAN--TAKES FREUD AND EXTENDS THEORY OF THE UNCONSCIOUS TO OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH OTHERS AND SOCIETY AS A WHOLE PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

We Want Our Mothers Jacques Lacan ( ) as IMAGINARY PHASE: One with mother (Oedipal) MIRROR STAGE: We recognize a separate being in mirror, feel “lack” for mother; recognition of OTHER but not SELF; birth of the never-fulfilled ego (ideal self-image) SYMBOLIC (Oedipal crisis): World of language and authority; Father rules; reason and order; unconscious is formed; emergence of desire REAL: Ultra-conscious experiences that lie beyond Language such as death, terror, ecstasy, love; inexpressible; Kant’s “thing in itself”; the complete unattainable world LACAN SAW THE INDIVIDUAL PROGRESSING THROUGH VARIOUS STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT FATHER NOT BIOLOGICAL FATHER IT IS THE PATRIARCHAL ASPECT OF SOCIETY WITH LAWS AND RULES PENIS--FRUED--WHAT WOMEN DO NOT HAVE PHALLIS--SYMBOLIC--LACAN--THE ATTRIBUTE OF PATRIARCHAL POWER THAT REPRESENTS POWER AND IS THE SIGNIFIER OF AN ORIGINAL DESIRE FOR A PERFECT UNION WITH THE OTHER--AND OF THE WHOLENESS WE LACK NEITHER MEN OR WOMAN HAVE IT PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

We Want Our Mothers Jacques Lacan ( ) as Phallogocentric view of life Male bias of authority God the Father We move from the “lost plenitude of the originary mother-infant symbiotic state” to a state dominated by Language and Logos (reason, knowledge, systems of order This provokes a sense of desire Feminists based theories upon Lacan LACAN SAW THE INDIVIDUAL PROGRESSING THROUGH VARIOUS STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT FATHER NOT BIOLOGICAL FATHER IT IS THE PATRIARCHAL ASPECT OF SOCIETY WITH LAWS AND RULES PENIS--FRUED--WHAT WOMEN DO NOT HAVE PHALLIS--SYMBOLIC--LACAN--THE ATTRIBUTE OF PATRIARCHAL POWER THAT REPRESENTS POWER AND IS THE SIGNIFIER OF AN ORIGINAL DESIRE FOR A PERFECT UNION WITH THE OTHER--AND OF THE WHOLENESS WE LACK NEITHER MEN OR WOMAN HAVE IT PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

We Want Our Mothers Jacques Lacan ( ) as IMAGINARY: Privileges fantasies and dreams SYMBOLIC: Tries to make sense of the sensory through cultural authority policeable by the intellect (Freud tried to translate the Imaginary Order into the conceptual Symbolic Order) LACAN SAW THE INDIVIDUAL PROGRESSING THROUGH VARIOUS STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT FATHER NOT BIOLOGICAL FATHER IT IS THE PATRIARCHAL ASPECT OF SOCIETY WITH LAWS AND RULES PENIS--FRUED--WHAT WOMEN DO NOT HAVE PHALLIS--SYMBOLIC--LACAN--THE ATTRIBUTE OF PATRIARCHAL POWER THAT REPRESENTS POWER AND IS THE SIGNIFIER OF AN ORIGINAL DESIRE FOR A PERFECT UNION WITH THE OTHER--AND OF THE WHOLENESS WE LACK NEITHER MEN OR WOMAN HAVE IT PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

The Unconscious As Other PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM
Jacques Lacan ( ) as There is no separation between self and society. Society inhabits the individual. Humans continue to look for an imaginary wholeness and unity We have a perpetual lack of wholeness. PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

Jacques Lacan (1901-81) as We constantly negate our identities.
The Unconscious As Other Jacques Lacan ( ) as We constantly negate our identities. This is what life is about. How we live and grow intellectually. Based on Hegel Thesis, antithesis, synthesis The thesis is the given state of things. … THIS COURSE Come into this course with a set of given facts and beliefs. Perhaps about how to read a poem. I negate your world view. Your comfort zone. Shatter your thesis. You have to negate what you know and reform your knowledge and your sense of self. PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

The Voice of the Father Jacques Lacan ( ) as How does the language of the text signify something other than what it says? What aspects of the text reflect the Imaginary, Symbolic or Real orders? Is there a voice of a mother or father present? Is the mother’s voice (less structured, more associational, more fluid) suppressed by a phallogocentric symbolic order? Evidence of a splintered, constructed self? How does the work reveal the particular conflicts produced by family life or social conditions during a particular historical period? What is the connection between the desires of the characters in the work, the desire of the author in writing the work, and the desire of the reader in reading the work? In other words, what is the connection between literary language and desire or between narrative and desire? Is there a psychic economy at work in this text which betrays the microphysics of power relations within the individual or within the represented domestic environment? How is the hegemony of parental authority, for example, translated into a character's own psychic economy? What relationship do characters have to the human body or to its desires and functions LIMITATIONS OF LACAN Intellectualized--no clinical proof (although others) Some feminists like-- identity a social construct Others see him as very male centric--phallic--women defined as lack Those who like like his view that language and symbols repress PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

Behavior Modification PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM
B. F. Skinner ( ) as We can’t know the “mind”--so why worry about it? Focus on behavior & what is observable Perceptions, thoughts, images, feelings are subjective and immune to measurement Operant conditioning (aversive & reinforcing stimuli) Skinner Box-- “rat in a cage” Walden II (utopian vision) PSYCHOANALYTIC CRITICISM

IDEOLOGICAL CRITICISM
Class Struggle Karl Marx ( ) as Communist Manifesto Saw capitalism as a driving force of history Predicted that it would conquer the world Lead to globalization of national economies and cultures Would divide world between “haves” and “have-nots” Class struggle Advocated abolition of private property, traditional marriage, concentration of political power in the hands of the proletariat ANOTHER STRUCTURED WAY OF LOOKING AT THE WORLD WAS MARXIST ALL KNOW WHO KARL MARX WAS IDEOLOGICAL CRITICISM

Silent Ideologies Karl Marx ( ) APPLICATION TO LITERARY THEORY: “Hermeneutics of suspicion” Focus on what the text hides (ideology is silent) Hegemony: “A pervasive system of assumptions, meanings and values…that shapes the way things look, what they mean, and what reality is for the majority of people within a given culture” (Antonio Gramsci) How characters are shaped and controlled by economics Hermeneutics--the science of interpretting Hedge EM ony--Leadership exercised by one power or class or state IDEOLOGICAL CRITICISM IDEOLOGICAL

Text as Power Karl Marx ( ) Questions a Marxist literary critic would ask: Who was the text written for? Is it a “power play” on the part of one class to dominate another? What is the underlying ideology? Does the main character affirm or resist bourgeoise values? Whose story gets told? Who is left out? In what way are characters or groups of people “commodified”? Role of media & consumerism? IDEOLOGICAL CRITICISM IDEOLOGICAL

You Are What You Consume
Jean Baudrillard (1929-) Cultural materialist Consumer objects = signs that differentiate the population Our postmodern society is no longer real. It is a simulation of the real. Mass media & consumerism have created a new myth of reality that we accept as real. We live in a state of hyper-reality. Simulacra: a copy without an origina TV news--always the same images Always in the present--never experience the past anymore We become numb to the content and message The medium is the message POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jean Baudrillard (1929-) America is a spectacle
The Myth of America Jean Baudrillard (1929-) America is a spectacle An illusionary paradise TV is the world Advertising gives consumers illusion of freedom “All is well” is the party line Illusion perpetuated by media & culture DISNEYLAND CNN PROBLEMS Doesn’t differentiate between different type of media All media bad Media is the arena of public discourse, where issues are resolved and consensus achieved Moral nihilism POSTSTRUCTURALISM

The Matrix Jean Baudrillard (1929-) Simulacrum: a copy of a copy whose relation to the model has become so attenuated that it can no longer properly be said to be a copy. It stands on its own as a copy without a model. “The airless atmosphere has asphyxiated the referent, leaving us satellites in aimless orbit around an empty center. We breathe an ether of floating images that no longer bear a relation to any reality whatsoever.” DISNEYLAND CNN PROBLEMS Doesn’t differentiate between different type of media All media bad Media is the arena of public discourse, where issues are resolved and consensus achieved Moral nihilism POSTSTRUCTURALISM

The Matrix Jean Baudrillard (1929-) In The Matrix, people “are living what has already been lived and reproduced with no reality anymore but that of the cannibalized image” (Paul Martin). Neo hides illegal software in Baudrillard’s book, Simulacra and Simulation (like Western gun fighters hid gins in Bibles). The virtual replaces the real. DISNEYLAND CNN PROBLEMS Doesn’t differentiate between different type of media All media bad Media is the arena of public discourse, where issues are resolved and consensus achieved Moral nihilism POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Rejection of Essentialism
Poststructuralism as POSTMODERN LITERARY THEORY Not a unified school: A group of theoretical positions Self-reflexive discourse that is “aware of the tentativeness, slipperiness, ambiguities and complex interrelations between texts and meanings.” (Lye) Rejects: Totalizing view All phenomenon under one concept Essentialist concept Reality independent of language Foundationalism Stable signifying systems rooted in human thought POSTMODERNISM

All Truths Are Cultural
Poststructuralism as STRUCTURALISM The individual is sacred The mind as the realm of meaning Universal laws and essences Inherent universal meanings that precede the text POSTSTRUCTURALISM The “subject” is a cultural construct Mind created from interactions as situated symbolic beings Truth is “local”; language creates reality Meaning is intertextual, determined by social discourse; changes with history POSTMODERNISM

Poststructuralism as Meanings are often hidden in the texts
A Rose is Not a Cow Poststructuralism as Meanings are often hidden in the texts Real meaning can be unlocked by deconstructing the text Must consider psychological, cultural, ideological, gender and other “power positions” of author, characters, intended readers Words are an endless chain of signifiers, pointing to nothing but themselves POSTMODERNISM

The Author Is Dead Roland Barthes ( ) as “The author is dead.” The text is a “multi-dimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash.” The reader “produces” a text on his or her own terms, forging meanings from “what has already been read, seen, done, lived.” A NAME YOU SHOULD KNOW PRECURSORS OF POSTMODERNISM

Down with Descartes Jaques Derrida (1930-) as Deconstruction is a theory of reading which aims to undermine the logic of opposition within texts. Skeptical postmodernist Attacks fundamental principles of Western philosophy Influenced by Nietzsche and Heidegger Attacks from a structuralist foundation Agrees that meaning is not inherent in signs Strongly disagrees with bifurcation of structuralism D is a serious critique of representation itself How difficult to tell the truth About language, the impossibility of representation. Assault on logocentricism POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) Nietzsche influence:
Language as Metaphor Jaques Derrida (1930-) Nietzsche influence: Language is radically metaphorical in nature Every idea originates through an equating of the unequal Metaphors are essentially groundless All assumptions must be questioned Must consider vast plurality of “wills to power” ROBERT FROST “I HAVE COME TO BELIEVE THAT ALL OF THINKING IS METAPHOR.” POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) as STRUCTURALISM is inherently flawed:
The Dangers of Dualism Jaques Derrida (1930-) as STRUCTURALISM is inherently flawed: Argues that all STRUCTURES have an implied center All systems have binary oppositions One part more important than another (good/evil, male/female) This is logocentrism—basic to all Western thought since Plato Leads to an implied humanistic value-laden system of thought We view the world with rigid boundaries Derrida wants to demonstrate that they are not so rigid Dark is not a polar opposite—it is part of light—contains a trace of it in its very meaning Wants to deconstruct these meanings Because they inhibit richer, complex interpretations, and nuances of existences, ambiguities, uncertainties, different possibilities DENIES THE METAPHYSICS OF PRESENCE THE REALM OF THE INDEPENDENT SIGNIFIED DOES NOT EXIST By deconstructing, basic units of logic are shown how they contradict themselves. Sees all writing as a complex, historical cultural process rooted in the relations of texts to each other and in the institutions and conventions of writing. Language operates in subtle and often contradictory ways. Certainty will always elude us. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) as LANGUAGE & MEANING
What’s Black Is White Jaques Derrida (1930-) as LANGUAGE & MEANING A meaning is always temporal and part of a network of meanings, part of a chain of meanings in a chain or system to which it belongs which is always changing. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) as THE SELF AS FICTION
Viv Le Difference Jaques Derrida (1930-) as THE SELF AS FICTION “Our self-presence is a fiction, we are in a constant state of differing and deferrence. As our center is not really a center, our self-presence is a fiction we create to disguise the play of opposition and displacement within which we live.” POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) as INTERTEXTUALITY:
Ecriture Jaques Derrida (1930-) as INTERTEXTUALITY: All texts refer to other texts (just as signs refer to other signs). No interpretations are final. The authority of any text is provisional. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Signifier Signifier Signifier
No Final Signified Jaques Derrida (1930-) as STRUCTURALISM Signified Signifier DECONSTRUCTION Signified Signifier Signifier Signifier POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) as DECONSTRUCTIVE INTERPRETATION:
The Unsaid Truth Jaques Derrida (1930-) as DECONSTRUCTIVE INTERPRETATION: Find binary opposition and implied center Refute claims Find contradictions, self-imposed logic that is faulty Focus on what text is saying is other than what it appears to be saying Look for gaps, margins, figures, echoes, digressions, discontinuities Male rationalism Female emotions POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Deconstructing Rousseau
Jaques Derrida (1930-) as BINARY OPPOSITIONS Nature / culture Health / disease Purity / contamination Simplicity / complexity Good / evil Speech / writing ASSUMED CENTER Nature is good WHAT HE IS REALLY SAYING Theme of lost innocence Naïve romantic illusion Western guilt over colonization TEXT PROVES OPPOSITE OF WHAT IT SAYS SURFACE LEVEL THE LIE WESTERN CIVILIZATION IS LIBERAL, HUMAN, AND ADMIRES ALLPEOPLE--ANTI RACISTS BENEATH THE SURFACE (THE UNINTELLIGIBLE LIE) WESTERN RACISM AND GUILT POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Male Domination Jaques Derrida (1930-) as Exclusions and repressions as important as what is said—in fact are more central: they point to the contingency of a central part What is not said provides clues to author’s real views of power Male Western authorities have encoded within their work silence about women and others (rationalized exploitation of others without knowing it). POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Man can find truth in nature.
Under Erasure Jaques Derrida (1930-) as Man can find truth in nature. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jaques Derrida (1930-) FREEDOM FROM TYRANNY
Richness of Language Jaques Derrida (1930-) FREEDOM FROM TYRANNY Meaning circulates by difference, by being other. It is creative and inventive. Affirms multiplicity, paradoxes, richness of our life . Frees ourselves from tyrannies of univocal readings. Opposes humanism, which puts man at the center. One can talk about ideas and work with views that man is at the center only by placing them “under erasure.” Closer to reality, less artificial POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Destruction is Good Jaques Derrida (1930-) as "If anything is destroyed in a deconstructive reading, it is not the text, but the claim to unequivocal domination of one mode of signifying over another. A deconstructive reading is a reading which analyses the specificity of a text's critical difference from itself." POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Fuzzy Reality Jaques Derrida (1930-) as Some literature that recognizes the highly mediated nature of our experience, and are playful, ironic, explicitly intertextual and deconstruct themselves may be closer to reality. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

What is Truth? Jaques Derrida (1930-) “What, therefore, is truth? A mobile army of metaphors, metonymies, anthropomorphisms; truths are illusions of which one has forgotten that they are illusions…” -- Nietzsche ROBERT FROST “I HAVE COME TO BELIEVE THAT ALL OF THINKING IS METAPHOR.” POSTSTRUCTURALISM

A Long Way from Aristotle
Jaques Derrida (1930-) TRADITIONAL THEORIES Mimetic Didactic Expressive of truths DECONSTRUCTION The author is dead History and literature become processes of intertextuality The careful reader is king ROBERT FROST “I HAVE COME TO BELIEVE THAT ALL OF THINKING IS METAPHOR.” POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Feminist Literary Theory
The Second Sex Feminist Literary Theory SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR ( ) The Second Sex Questioned the “othering” of women by Western philosophy Rediscovery of forgotten women’s literature Revolutionary advocacy of sexual politics Questioning of underlying phallocentric, Western, rational ideologies Pluralism: gender, sexual, cultural, ethnicity, postcolonial perspectives Another important movement of PM No longer male-centric world POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Gender As a Social Construct Feminist Literary Theory Exorcise the male mind Deconstructs logocentricism of male discourse Sees gender as a cultural construct So are stereotypes Focus on unique problems of feminism: History and themes of women literature Female language Psycho-dynamics of female creativity POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Feminizing Freud Feminist Literary Theory JULIA KRISTEVA (1941-) Psychologist, linguist & novelist Influenced by Barthes, Freud & Lacan “Dismantles all ideologies,” including feminism Does not consider herself a feminist Disagrees with “patriarchal” views of Freud and Lacan Maternal body source of language and “laws” (not paternal anti-Oedipal drive) Columbia U, lives in France Written on theology, semiotics, philosophy, politics, 2 novels Difficult to read POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Madness, Holiness & Poetry Feminist Literary Theory Masculine symbolic order represses feminine semiotic order Semiotic open to men and women writers Semiotic is “creative”--marginal discourse of the avant garde Raw material of signification from pre-Oedipal drives (linked to mother) Realm of the subversive forces of madness, holiness and poetry Creative, unrepressed energy Columbia U, lives in France Written on theology, semiotics, philosophy, politics, 2 novels Difficult to read POSTSTRUCTURALISM

I Am Woman Feminist Literary Theory Challenges Judeo-Christian icons of woman Balancing act: live within Lacan’s symbolic order of patriarchal laws without losing uniqueness Women can produce own symbols and language Multiplicity of female expression “To break the code, to shatter language, to find specific discourse closer to the body and emotions, to the unnamable repressed by the social contract.” Kristeva Columbia U, lives in France Written on theology, semiotics, philosophy, politics, 2 novels Difficult to read POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Binary Equals Feminist Literary Theory as ALICE JARDINE, Gynesis (1982) Woman as a binary opposition Man/woman Rational/irrational Good/evil Implied male logocentricism The concept of jouissance POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Helene Cixcous as Critic, novelist, playwright
The Joy of Jouissance Helene Cixcous as Critic, novelist, playwright Picks up where Lacan leaves off Denounces patriarchal binary oppositions Women enter into the Symbolic Order differently Deconstructs patriarchal Greek myths Femininity (jouissance) unrepresentable in phallocentric scheme of things Favors a “bisexual” view POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Deconstructing Sigmund
Helene Cixcous as Women are closer to the Imaginary Women more fluid, less fixed The individual woman must write herself Feminine literature: not objective; erase differences between order and chaos, text and speech; inherently deconstructive Admires Joyce and Poe Men can produce feminist literature POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Queer Theory as Gender and sexuality not “essential” to identity
Queer Ideas Queer Theory as Gender and sexuality not “essential” to identity Socially constructed Mutable and changeable Self shaped by language, signs and signifiers. Self becomes a subject in language, with more multiplicity of meaning. Western ideas of sexual identity come from science, religion, economics and politics and were constructed as binary oppositions About spin off from feminist studies Humanist view--identity and self are unique to you Feminist theory deconstructed the idea of the essential self Gay and lesbian studies Gender bending--Michael Jackson, Boy George, Dennis Rodman--men with earings, women with tatoos Politics: China--one child today. Many concubines before. Mormons--multiple wives. Roman eunuchs. POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Deconstructing Sex Queer Theory as Queer theory deconstructs all binary oppositions about human sexuality. Encourages the examination of the world from an alternative view. Allows for the inclusion of gender, sexuality, race and other areas of identity by noticing the distinctions between identities, communities, and cultures. Challenges heterosexism and homophobia, in addition to racism, misogyny and other oppressive discourses while celebrating diversity. Some argue for separation of all forms of sexual behavior of any kind of moral judgment. But what if not consensual, hurts someone else POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Postcolonialism as Attempts to resurrect colonized cultures
The Myth of the Orient Postcolonialism as Attempts to resurrect colonized cultures Deconstruct Western view of third-world nations as “otherness” Edward Said: “Orientalism” was an artificial word constructed by the West to talk about and the East (Typical binary opposition) Empire-building nations used literature as power Ingrained Western myths & phallic logocentricism in colonized people Worked based upon Foucault’s notions of discourse and power POSTSTRUCTURALISM

So? The white-Western-male view of the world is dead
Now What? So? The white-Western-male view of the world is dead New Criticism, Marxism & Structuralism are passe We now have a new set of “lenses” to view the world We understand the importance of being suspicious (literature is not necessarily sincere) We recognize that truth, identity, gender, etc. are social constructs, contingent and local We recognize the power of discourse PM “explains” the global world in which we live White western male--at least reduced to only one of many possibilities The white Western male view of the world is dead New Criticism & Structuralism are flawed We now have a new set of “lenses” to view the world We understand the importance of being suspicious (literature is not necessarily sincere) Hidden texts, ideologies, gender bias, philo. Bia wary of grand narratives--K&K--know it alls We recognize that truth, identity, gender, etc. are social constructs, contingent and local We recognize the power of discourse How we are all shaped by language, pop culture, advertising, education, films, TV, music POSTSTRUCTURALISM

The Dangers of Postmodernism
Proceed with Caution The Dangers of Postmodernism Can lead to intellectual nihilism & cynicism From the comfortable foundation of humanism to absolute relativism and pluralism Whose lens is “correct”? Who says so? Is humanism really all that bad? It’s all theory How do we use theory? Apply all to all texts? Glib, hip intellectualism WHY ONLY THESE THEORIES? POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Proceed with Caution Where Do We Go from Here? Has the progress of history come to a dead-end? (as Foucault and Lyotard suggest) Have we reached the point of self-defeating moral relativism? Jameson: We need narratives, and some sort of history We need to re-endow the individual History, literature have important functions Sarup: We need to keep the Enlightenment project alive WHY ONLY THESE THEORIES? POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Different Ways to “Read” a Film/Novel
Archetypal Freudian / Lacanian Ideological Deconstructionist Feminist Queer Post-colonial

Introduction to Postmodernism & Contemporary Literary Theory

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Introduction to Postmodernism & Contemporary Literary Theory

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