RESOURCES
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Week 5 Notes:The following notes are highlights from the above chapter. They are neither intended to replace the lectures and text, nor to substitute for a reading of the text. Lectures will add to and supplement material given here. In order to do well in this class, it is recommended that you review these notes to identify main ideas after having attended class. Reading philosophical essays is more challenging in that you often have to scan once, read once, and review once before you can adequately explain the author's position. In order to be sure that you are receiving maximum benefit from your time spent studying, try to answer the guide questions posed below. If you cannot answer them, it is time to read or review to be sure you understand the main arguments presented.
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What is postmodernism?One must begin the discussion of postmodernism by discussing modernity before the 20th century. Modern ideals begin appearing in the works of Descartes and end in the obtuse prose of Hegel. To sum, modernism is a philosophical movement characterized by its investigations of space-time, consciousness, and being. In each case modern philosophers searched for the foundations underlying each idea and then strove to communicate "first principles" for axiology, epistemology and metaphysics. During the modern period so-called foundationalists were looking for unifying principles that could ground the most basic questions posed in each branch of philosophical study. Each modern philosopher began his major works by exploring the work that had preceded him and then set out to explain how various approaches to axiology, epistemology or metaphysics might be explained by one central idea. For example, in the case of axiology (ethics) Kant argues that the categorical imperative is the ultimate weapon for solving all ethical disputes. After the advent of WWII, successive generations of ethicists have not been similarly convinced. Some philosophers regard Marx as the first postmodern thinker because they believe historical materialism is the first historically situated attempt at explaining the differences in ethical reasoning. Most, however, might bestow the title "first postmodernist" on Nietzsche because he wholeheartedly rejects the foundationalist assumption that metaphysics can be unified under one Platonic principle. The postmodernists we will reading also reject the idea that there will be absolute principles grounding any particular branch of philosophy.
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Latest Links òNotes |
Resource Links for this week's assignment:Pages devoted to postmodern thought: these are the same resources I listed on our poststructuralist notes page.
Baudrillard:
Lyotard:
Spivak
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