Dr Philip Holden (email: ellhpj@nus.edu.sg)
[ Introduction and Description | Schedule and Readings | Assessment and Policies | Related Resources ]Here we move on to a further theoretical perspective, postmodernism. Unlike the theoretical perspectives we have seen previously, postmodernism is more an intellectual and artistic movement than a particular "school" of theory.
One of the first things you’ll notice is that postmodernism is a different type of literary theory from those that we have seen before. Narratology is a theory about the way texts work, and demands close reading of these texts through their methodological lenses. Postcolonialism and feminism are more issue-based, in the sense that they respond to a larger environment outside the text: practitioners of these theoretical approaches may use a variety of methodologies on the texts they are interested in. Marxism, which we'll see later, might be seen as sitting somewhere between these two different kinds of reading: it is a specific approach, based upon a particular philosophical position about how the world works. However, the nature of Marxism as a mode of inquiry means that texts inevitably have to be related to the societies in which they are written and read.
Postmodernism is different from this in that it is a literary and artistic movement. Peter Barry gives an account of the difference between modernism and postmodernism—the border between the two is, in fact, very porous, and while some writers will identify as “postmodernists” many will not. Architecture, as Peter Barry mentions, is a useful way of thinking through the distinctions. In Singapore, traditional architecture might take many forms: the Imperial Classicism from the European tradition, for instance, or the Thian Hock Keng Temple as an example of traditional Chinese (Fujianese) architecture. In each case the building is part of an established system of meaning.
An example of a modernist building might be Raffles City (although note that the interior refurbishment a few years ago has now given the inside of the shopping centre a distinctly postmodern feel, with playful water fountains and a bizarre pendulum in a marble-clad tower). The outside of the building is austere and modernist, encased in what looks like metal cladding—it follows Le Corbusier’s precept that a building is a “machine for living in.” Postmodern architecture is exemplified by William Lim’s Gallery Hotel (formerly the Gallery Evason Hotel). Here the effect is playful—the hotel looks as though various parts of it have been thrown together, as if a child was playing with the pieces of a hotel toy and hadn’t quite put it all together. We have the industrial metal, but we also have a riot of primary colours. The effect is “tongue in cheek” Barry (85).
Linked to postmodernism, and perhaps more controversial than postmodern artistic practice, is the notion of postmodernity. Some philosophers believe that we have now entered a new global “condition,” in which old certainties have fallen away, and have been replaced with free play, experimentation—“grand narratives” have been replaced with “mini narratives.” Among those who believe that there has been a radical change in the way human beings see the world are Francois Lyotard and Jean Baudrillard, whom Peter Barry mentions. If you’d like a further take on Baudrillard and Lyotard, you may want to follow the links attached.
When you feel you have a handle on what postmodernism is or might be, have a think about the section of the chapter where Peter Barry mentions "what postmodernist critics do." How would a postmodernist critic respond to The English Patient?
Last updated: 8 November, 2007
