Recruiting (post)Postmodernists
Interesting discussion going on over at Andrea's blog on Postmodernism. I'm recruiting help for the support side. I can't be the only one who doesn't think it's all a bunch of hogwash.
In class the other day, one of the students was saying that his first reaction to Hiroshima mon Amour was that it is the type of film that all his friends assumed you watch in film studies. I think that's an accurate depiction of university studies. Every now and then I come across a reading that you can instantly imagine being made fun of as a bunch of snobby academic circle-running and hot air. A lot of academic thought has been caricaturized, exaggerating a particular feature to the point where you can't help but laugh.
"I think therefore I am" - pretty self-obvious banal statement ('a five year old could have said that' kind of statement) with centuries of ramifications.
(ceci n'est pas) "Ceci n'est pas une pipe"
- It looks like a pipe to me.
- No, it's a (bunch of 1s and 0s being reinterpreted into a punch of coloured pixels which you perceive as a digital representation of a) painting.
- Oh, ok... it's not a pipe, it's a representation of (a representation of) a pipe. That's just playing word games. A five year old could tell you that it's not a pipe but a painting of a pipe.
- Then why did you think it was a silly statement?
Critical thinking (a huge component of postmodernism) is questioning how we see, represent, think of, exist in... the world and what how our assumptions, instincts come to effect that. For that reason I think most (good) postmodernists obsess over defining their terminology, outlining their assumptions and historicizing their position. It makes the readings dense and highly contextual. There's usually a good reason for stating the obvious, it's usually only obvious once it's been said which usually makes you wonder if it is so obvious.
In class the other day, one of the students was saying that his first reaction to Hiroshima mon Amour was that it is the type of film that all his friends assumed you watch in film studies. I think that's an accurate depiction of university studies. Every now and then I come across a reading that you can instantly imagine being made fun of as a bunch of snobby academic circle-running and hot air. A lot of academic thought has been caricaturized, exaggerating a particular feature to the point where you can't help but laugh.
"I think therefore I am" - pretty self-obvious banal statement ('a five year old could have said that' kind of statement) with centuries of ramifications.
(ceci n'est pas) "Ceci n'est pas une pipe"- It looks like a pipe to me.
- No, it's a (bunch of 1s and 0s being reinterpreted into a punch of coloured pixels which you perceive as a digital representation of a) painting.
- Oh, ok... it's not a pipe, it's a representation of (a representation of) a pipe. That's just playing word games. A five year old could tell you that it's not a pipe but a painting of a pipe.
- Then why did you think it was a silly statement?
Critical thinking (a huge component of postmodernism) is questioning how we see, represent, think of, exist in... the world and what how our assumptions, instincts come to effect that. For that reason I think most (good) postmodernists obsess over defining their terminology, outlining their assumptions and historicizing their position. It makes the readings dense and highly contextual. There's usually a good reason for stating the obvious, it's usually only obvious once it's been said which usually makes you wonder if it is so obvious.
Labels: debate
