What is postmodernism?

What is postmodernism?

Postmodernism is hard to describe in a defined dictionary term as it is such an open and subjective word which reflects on what in fact it means. This is because it is always changing due to the modern culture world we live in. Its main purpose is to emphasize on the role of power relations in which it uses to classify labels, goths, emos, chavs. Stereotypes on males and females and also moral queries on homosexual people. This has also been described by Fredric Jameson as the “Dominate cult of late capitalism.”

It would be best described as a theory of what is real and what fantasy is as fantasy can also refer to the media. As we live in a place where everything is dominated by the media which has massive influences on our everyday life without us even noticing. Examples of these are the obsessions young generations have due to the social networking sites of twitter, facebook and youtube, where the ‘sex appeal’ is the major concern upon young teenagers and the idea to look ‘perfect’ is in everyone’s mind-set.

The term dates back to the 1870s where it was use as a general theory of the historical movement, which was then later used in 1949 to describe the frustration with modern construction that lead to post-modern culture movement. However in this modern era the ideas that are conjured into what post-modern is relates to a variety of things which include, culture, love, marriage, social revolution. This is then often and associated with unity, authority and certainly while the post modernism is more towards t difference,  and textuality.

A lot of post-modern writers fail to see the rational side  in which scientist do when it foes to economics, politics, morality and society, especially with Marxism and Freudianism. Its so open because of conservatism and relatisivn as we cannot judge our own neighbourhoods from everyone’s point of view as each will be different depending on their surroundings and experiences.

Modernism was also criticised for being the subject of a perceived ideal perfection and attempt to create harmony in peoples mind, as the critics of modernism argued that a perfect mind-set is subjective to all as we each have our own view on the matter which is individual. Some significant contributions to the topic come from top literary figures which include Jorge Luis Borges, William S. Burroughs, and Samuel Beckett. (Jorge Luis Borges experimented in metafiction and magical realism, while William S. Burroughs wrote the prototypical post-modern novel Naked Lunch and developed the cut up method (similar to Tristan Tzara's "How to Make a Dadaist Poem") to create other novels such as Nova Express. Samuel Beckett attempted to escape the shadow of James Joyce by focusing on the failure of language, schizophrenia, and humanity's inability to overcome its condition, themes later to be explored in such works as Waiting for Godot.)

So to actually sum up what is post modernism is a lot harder and broader than you think as one very small word can mean so much more as it looks.