Post Modern?

[Epee_Pox]

An article in today's paper on postmodernism beginning to fade from US campuses reminded me about this thread.

http://www.fencing101.com/vb/showthread.php?t=13872

It was only in the NYC-specific folder, so I wonder what the broader population of this board thinks. (It's a subject I know little about, myself.)

[Moses]

It's a product of the neo-conservative movement*. Our (American's) politics and media sources are becoming more inundated with conservative viewpoints. Now, in defiance of the Civil-rights era paradigm, college students on most American campuses are more conservative than their professors (because these professors were the young, impressionable and liberal students during the 1960's and 70's). With the Republican philosophy becoming the most prevalent way of thinking amongst politically-minded young people and the fact that, since the Reagan administration, the Republicans have been dominated by the Christian right (fundamentalists who have rigidly constructed worldviews), the de-centralized, semi-amoral life philosophy is becoming less common.

*(Yes, Inq, I know you hate that term, but "new conservative" refers to post-Goldwater era of Republican conservatism becoming more prominent in most voting citizens. Neo-conservativism refers to a political and chronological era, not a specific philosophy. It's a misnomer along the lines of the Spanish Flu and, well, post-modernism).

I need sleep.

-Da Mose

[Gav]

The one thing I took away from that thread is that some people seem to think it's an american thing - it's not.

Post modernism is also an artistic movement - something that didn't seem to get mentioned in that thread.

[Moses]

I don't see how you drew that conclusion, Gav. I didn't read the whole thread but at least two people prefixed their posts with how post-modernism manifested itself aesthetically in addition to politically and culturally.

-Da Mose

[Inquartata]

I thought this thread was going to be about new ways of using the French grip.

[Epee_Pox]

It's a product of the neo-conservative movement*. Our (American's) politics and media sources are becoming more inundated with conservative viewpoints. Now, in defiance of the Civil-rights era paradigm, college students on most American campuses are more conservative than their professors (because these professors were the young, impressionable and liberal students during the 1960's and 70's). With the Republican philosophy becoming the most prevalent way of thinking amongst politically-minded young people and the fact that, since the Reagan administration, the Republicans have been dominated by the Christian right (fundamentalists who have rigidly constructed worldviews), the de-centralized, semi-amoral life philosophy is becoming less common.

*(Yes, Inq, I know you hate that term, but "new conservative" refers to post-Goldwater era of Republican conservatism becoming more prominent in most voting citizens. Neo-conservativism refers to a political and chronological era, not a specific philosophy. It's a misnomer along the lines of the Spanish Flu and, well, post-modernism).

I need sleep.

-Da Mose

How sad, to form a philosophy by reacting against lesser approaches. Such people are always defined by those they disdain, rather than being defined by their own meaning.

Of course, deconstructionist/postmodernist types don't believe in definition or meaning, it seems, so they're blind to their own irony. Which is the best kind of irony.

[keith]

Of course, deconstructionist/postmodernist types don't believe in definition or meaning, it seems, so they're blind to their own irony. Which is the best kind of irony.

sorry but utter bull**** - deconstructionism is open to all sorts of game playing with meaning and the derivation of meaning, that is part of the point. It is also why quite frequently the joke is on the people who think deconstructionism is 'blind to its own irony'. It does not preclude having fixed political beliefs; or rather it probably reflects the good old 'political as personal' which funnily enough used to be a liberal cry but now seems more firmly embraced by the right *shrug*.

Anyway rebelling against the eldurs is one of the least imaginative ways of behaving. But it know seems to be a well established college tradition - just wait another twenty years for it to flick back again.