- "Skepticism toward the 'grand narratives' of modernism; rejection of epistemic (scientific) certainty or the stability of meaning; and sensitivity to the role of ideology in maintaining political power."
A broad intellectual movement that developed in the mid- to late-20th century across philosophy, the arts, architecture, and criticism, characterized by a self-conscious rejection of the values and conventions of the preceding era of modernism, and a focus on deconstructing and challenging the concepts of truth, objectivity, and progress.
Modernism: The historical context and philosophical movement that preceded postmodernism, characterized by a belief in progress, rationality, and a preference for simplicity and clarity in art and culture.
Structuralism: A theoretical approach in social sciences that emphasizes the relationship between symbolic systems (such as language or culture) and the reality they represent.
Deconstruction: A critical approach to texts (and later extended to other cultural artifacts) that seeks to reveal and challenge the assumptions and power relations underlying them, by showing how meaning is not fixed but rather dependent on context and interpretation.
Postcolonialism: An intellectual and political response to the legacy of colonialism, which analyzes the continued economic, social, and cultural domination of formerly colonized peoples and seeks to promote their self-determination and cultural diversity.
Feminism: A theoretical and political movement that aims to end sexism and gender-based oppression by advocating for women's rights, gender equality, and a critique of patriarchal power structures.
Marxism: A political and economic theory that critiques capitalism and promotes a vision of social and economic equality based on collective ownership and control of the means of production.
Psychoanalysis: A complex psychological theory and therapeutic approach that seeks to explore the unconscious mind and the ways in which individuals navigate their desires, anxieties, and relationships in the world.
Existentialism: A philosophical movement that emphasizes individual freedom, personal responsibility, and the search for meaning and purpose in life.
Semiotics: The study of signs and symbols and their meaning in different cultural, social, and historical contexts.
Cultural Studies: An interdisciplinary field that examines the ways in which culture reflects and shapes social identities, values, and power relations, and seeks to explore and challenge dominant cultural forms and discourses.
Postmodern Architecture: An architectural style that emerged in the 1960s and 70s and rejected the formal purity and functionalism of modernist architecture, emphasizing instead fragmentation, eclecticism, and irony.
New Historicism: A literary and cultural theory that emphasizes the ways in which literature and culture reflect and interact with political and historical power structures, and seeks to challenge traditional notions of "objective" historical truth.
Globalization: A complex social, economic, and cultural phenomenon that characterizes the world in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, characterized by the increasing interconnectedness and interdependence of nations and regions, the spread of global capitalism, and the emergence of new forms of cultural exchange and hybridization.
Postmodern Art: An artistic movement that emerged in the 1960s and 70s and rejected traditional aesthetic norms and values, emphasizing instead the fragmentation, ambiguity, and irony of contemporary culture.
Postmodern Ethics: An approach to ethics that rejects the notion of an objective, absolute moral truth, and instead emphasizes the contingency and plurality of ethical norms and values, as well as the complex and fluid nature of moral decision-making.
Deconstruction: Informed by the work of Jacques Derrida, deconstruction seeks to explore the ways in which language and culture create binary oppositions and hierarchies that obscure their own contingency and instability. Deconstructionism tries to break down the binary oppositions we create in language.
Post-Structuralism: A related approach to deconstruction, post-structuralism emphasizes the role of power relations and historical contingency in shaping language, culture, and identity. Many post-structuralists draw on the work of Michel Foucault, who explored the ways in which social institutions and practices shape our understanding of ourselves and the world.
Postmodern Feminism: Feminism has historically been seen as a critique of modernity and its underlying assumptions about rationality, objectivity, and individualism. Postmodern feminism builds on this critique by exploring the ways in which gender, sexuality, and other social identities are constructed and contested in different historical and cultural contexts.
Postmodern Philosophy: As a philosophical approach, postmodernism challenges the modern ontological assumptions and emphasizes contingency, context, and relativism. Postmodern philosophy encompasses a wide range of views, but some of the key thinkers in this field include Jean-Francois Lyotard, Richard Rorty, and Gilles Deleuze.
Postmodern Art: Postmodern art is characterized by its rejection of modernist ideals of progress and originality, and its embrace of hybridity, appropriation, and pastiche. Postmodern artists often draw on popular culture, historical styles and motifs, and diverse sources of inspiration to create works that are self-reflexive and critical of traditional aesthetic norms.
Postcolonialism: Postcolonialism seeks to explore the impact of colonialism on culture, identity, and politics in the former colonies and the contemporary global context. Postcolonial scholars and writers often focus on the ways in which colonialism has shaped knowledge production, historic narratives, and power structures, and seek to counter these legacies through critical engagement with the colonial past and its present effects.
- "Claims to objectivity are dismissed as naïve realism, with attention drawn to the conditional nature of knowledge claims within particular historical, political, and cultural discourses."
- "Self-referentiality, epistemological relativism, moral relativism, pluralism, irony, irreverence, and eclecticism."
- "It rejects the 'universal validity' of binary oppositions, stable identity, hierarchy, and categorization."
- "Initially emerging from a mode of literary criticism, postmodernism developed in the mid-twentieth century as a rejection of modernism."
- "Postmodernism is associated with the disciplines deconstruction and post-structuralism."
- "Postmodernism has been observed across many disciplines."
- "Various authors have criticized postmodernism as promoting obscurantism, as abandoning Enlightenment, rationalism and scientific rigor, and as adding nothing to analytical or empirical knowledge."
- "Rejection of epistemic (scientific) certainty or the stability of meaning."
- "Sensitivity to the role of ideology in maintaining political power."
- "Claims to objectivity."
- "Moral relativism."
- "Stable identity."
- "In the mid-twentieth century."
- "The 'grand narratives' of modernism."
- "The stability of knowledge claims within particular historical, political, and cultural discourses."
- "Irony and irreverence."
- "Categorization."
- "Promoting obscurantism."
- "Hierarchy."