From: blz1@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Betsy L Zucker)
Newsgroups: alt.postmodern
Subject: Re: Trash
Date: 6 Oct 92 22:07:06 GMT
Reply-To: blz1@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Betsy L Zucker)
Organization: Columbia University


Yes, Gordon, you're right, there is no Santa Clauss, there is no
metanarrative, and therefore, there is, of course, no
postmodernism.	However, the word does call up a certain
theoretical ambiance, which for me goes beyond banal
self-referential literature and tv (altho these are both symptoms
of postmodern culture).

Following Lyotard (see the quotes below), I take postmodern to
refer not to a movement but to a culture, specifically, the
culture that exists in postindustrial societies, i.e. in
societies in which information is the major source of power and
in which manipulation of informational capital becomes a
preoccupation in science, industry, government and popular
culture.

The reason that self-referential art partially partakes of a
postmodern outlook is that it begins to question its own
informational value and is thus somewhat aware of its own
position as a piece of capital in an information-mad society.
The reason I railed in my last post against newsertainment is
that its self-reference is *in the service of the info-power
brokers* and is therefore not truly aware of its role in the
global info-power exchange.  It *refers* to its own being as an
info tool but it does not *reflect* on the consequences of that
being or on the sources of legitimation of that being.

A recent post here from Jonas Sami Celebiler argues against the
phrase 'light entertainment'.  I agree entirely: racsist garbage
like Romancing the Stone (and I'd add Indiana Jones) is neither
light nor entertainment.  It is perhaps entertain*ing* (if you
like that kinda thing) but it is not entertain*ment*, it is heavy
didacticism whose role in the info-flow is to help legitimate the
cultural hegemony of the USA over them heathen furiners.  To
call it entertainment is to participate in the blurring of
advertisement-news-entertainment that I spoke of in my last post.
Is it coincidence that these nuevo-retro H. Rider Haggard third
world adventures appear in our culture just as our prime demon
shifts from communists to petty Panamanian dictators and (taking
newsertainment's phrase) two-bit shiekdoms?  Haggard's (and Rice
Burrogh's) fictions lamented and witnessed the end of classic
colonialism, does their return to the big screen herald its
rebirth?  Tarzan no like scud missiles.  Scuds kill elephants.	Tarzan
break scuds.  Ungawa!

In case you (alt.pm regulars and lurkers) hadn't guessed, I am
trying to find out what postmodernism is by pretending that I
already know ... feel free to disabuse me of my illusions.

And now from Jean-Franois Lyotard's _The Postmodern Condition: A
Report on Knowledge_, 1988, Minneapolis: U. of Minnesota Press.
Originally *La Condition postmoderne: rapport sur le savoir*,
1979, Les Editions de Minuit.

	"postmodern ... designates the state of our
	culture following the transformations which,
	since the end of the nineteenth century , have
	altered the game rules for science, literature,
	and the arts."  [p. xxiii]

	"I define postmodern as incredulity toward
	metanarratives."  [p. xxiv]

	"Knowledge in the form of an informational commodity
	indispensable to productive power is already, and will
	continue to be, a major -- perhaps *the* major -- stake
	in the worldwide competition for power."  [p. 5]


Still suffering from PMS (postmodern syndrome, of course), I
remain (newsreader headers to the contrary),


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	  Jeff Zucker  c/o  <blz1@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu>
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