A New Kind of Conversation

First, lets get one thing straight: there isn’t such a thing as “postmodernism,” i.e., some nicely defined set of beliefs. In fact, the words postmodern and postmodernism are thrown around so indiscriminately that they often seem to mean just about anything. If you’re against “postmodernism,” then usually everything bad is “postmodern” (and this often works the other way around). Moreover, the various “Postmodernisms” in architecture, art, literature, philosophy, social theory, and theology don’t exactly mesh (in terms of time periods, characteristics or theorists). With those crucial caveats in mind, probably the best way of thinking of postmodernism is an “attitude” (which is how Michel Foucault describes modernity) that is a reaction to the attitude of modernity.The modern attitude starts with the self. Moderns like Rene Descartes and Immanuel Kant exhort us to “Think for ourselves’ (which for Kant is the essence of being “enlightened”). For Descartes, that means setting aside one’s beliefs and starting from scratch. For Kant, it means that you rely only on your own reason. Although some moderns, like David Hume, drastically question reason’s capacities, generally the modern attitude toward reason was highly positive. It was generally assumed that rational people who had all the facts in hand could come to agreement (at least regarding truths which were “self-evident”). It was likewise assumed that no problems were too big for human reason to handle (though Kant had serious questions about the limits of human reason).Although critics sometimes charge that the postmodern attitude also begins with the self, that attitude is best described as “hypermodernism” (something which one finds, say in Friedrich Nietzsche). Actually, that point is telling, for it often happens that “modern” philosophers have “postmodern” characteristics, and vice versa. To take Nietzsche as an example, his philosophy is very strongly built around the self, but one couldn’t ask for a more vociferous critic of the view that rationality would solve all problems or that it is somehow “universal.” Nietzsche is convinced that perceiving and thinking are inherently perspectival, which means we relate to the world from our own individual preconceptions and also those of the culture and communities of which we are a part. Ass to thinking for ourselves, Foucault shows just how deeply our thinking is mediated by cultural and historical conditions—of which we are often unaware. For Hans-Georg Gadamer, this recognition means that understanding is always communal in the sense that one doesn’t simply understand on one’s own. Postmodern thinkers argue that the autonomous subject is a human creation—and generally a bad one at that. Emmanuel Levinas has gone so far as to argue that it has made is unto egoists and that the only way to change that ethically reprehensible situation is to put the other first. With the demise of the autonomous subject has come the demise of the author as supremely powerful. Postmoderns point out that, since no one :owns: language, encapsulating ones meaning in a text is only partially successful. Further social theorists take the demise of the autonomous subject to mean that much of “who we are” is socially constructed.Critics of postmodernity often charge that it is just “relativism” or “skepticism.” Certainly the badge of relativism is one that Richard Rorty would gladly wear. But, at least in terms of the major thinkers of postmodernity, that charge generally doesn’t fit. Evan though it is often leveled against Jacques Derrida, for example, he has gone out of his way to argue that justice is absolute and that meaning is hardly, “relative” in the sense of “It can mean whatever you want it to mean.” He (rightly) accuses those who make such accusations of not having read him carefully (or, more likely not having read him at all). Unfortunately, lack of reading the primary texts of postmodern is all too typical among critics of postmodernity. Despite all the differences in postmodern thinkers they would generally agree that we think and know only in connection with others, our knowing is always culturally and historically conditioned, and human reason is considerably less powerful than many Enlightenment thinkers assumed. There are, of course, stronger and weaker forms of these theses. Modernist often insist on what they call “realism,” the idea that there truly is a “reality out there”…Given an example…”Lemons are sour” this statement is about lemons just as equally as it is about humans. This examples bolters both realism and the fact that we as human beings happen to find lemons sour. Here there is a huge difference between claiming that there is a “world out there” (Metaphysical claim) and claiming that we can know that world “Just as it is” (an epistemological claim). Postmoderns vary on the extent to which we can know the world “just as it is,” but most would not simply give up this distinction. So the charge of “antirealism” against postmodern thinkers is frequently unwarranted.