Postmodernism

Postmodernism

Introduction

The term postmodernism first coined in the 1970's in architectural circles, but become popular when Jean Francois Lytard used it in his famous book “The Postmodern Condition”. He defined the term as incredulity towards matanarratives. Here, he is referring to the metanarrative given by science, which has become fragmented and specialized that one cannot speak of it in terms of a unified choice (Handelman, H., 2011).

Discussion

Postmodernism set itself apart from the traditional modernist commitments, beliefs and attitudes. It is known as an emerging movement in all aspects of life which includes order and purpose, and came forward as the denunciation of the traditional aesthetic rules of modern way of social and economic life (Handelman, H., 2011).

Postmodern in no time turned into a portmanteau term which one can applied to multiple range of cultural phenomena, especially in cinema and art and also showing its effects on philosophy and literature. Stanley Genz describes various aspects of postmodernism in his book named Primer on Postmodernism. As stated by Genz, the postmodern principals suggest that there is no such thing as absolute truth or hard proven fact. Religion is wrong when it indicates that our society is divided between good and evil, the choice between right and wrong (Morshedizad, A., 2008).

As stated by the postmodernist perspectives, sense of identity in the context of modernism depends upon the nature of one social and economic environment, personal intuitions, conscious and unconscious opinion and believe systems, knowledge about the self and ones interaction with one's internal and external cultures.

As stated by this perspective, individual has no fixed identity of its own; rather they have acquired a kind of flexible identity. This kind of identity provides them with an opportunity to perform various experimentations with their personal identity and construct them in accordance with their own desires ...