Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Postmodernism Postmodernity

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Postmodernism - A challenge to the assumptions of
  modern thought the death of reason
  (Power,1990)
• Postmodernity Social changes that herald the
  decline of the society constructed through modern
  ways of thinking
• Start with modernity -

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Background
• Renaissance 14th 16th century
• The Reformation 1517
• Deism

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Immanuel Kant
• Sapere aude have courage to use your own
  understanding.
• Also Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot etc. radical
  doubt, questioning and emancipatory knowledge

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• The Enlightenment 17th 18th century
• Individualism Individual Freedom
• Reason/Rationality
• Order
• Progress

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Romanticism Late 18th - 19th century (anti
  enlightenments cold rationality)
• Individualism
• Experience
• Emotions
• Nature
• The Past (Nations)

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Modern Society (Modernity)
• Individualism (unified and autonomous sense of
  self)
• Order Control
• Science
• De-traditionalization Secularization
• Complex Division of Labour

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Industrialism
• Bureaucracy
• Professionalism Expertise
• Fordism/Production/Career (Job for Life)
• Economic Management
• Urbanisation
• Optimism/Confidence

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Two main strands to modern thought and its
  application mechanization of social order
  emancipation of the lifeworld (Cooper Burrell,
  1988)
• Systemic Modernism
• Instrumental rationality applied to control
  complex organisations and tasks (see Weber,
  Fordism, Ritzer etc.)

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Critical Modernism
• Critical reason applied to advancing
  understanding for the improvement of society
• Rational Science and Social Science
• Social Constructionism

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Jurgen Habermas
• Enlightenment project incomplete
• Instrumental rationality (systemic) constraining
  rationalitys emancipatory (critical) potential
  see colonisation of the lifeworld
• Need for revival of critical rationality through
  ideal speech community

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Anthony Giddens
• Late Modernity (superficiality, scepticism and
  consumerism extensions of modernity not new
  era)
• Reflexive Modernity modernity as
  post-traditional
• Global Modernity, Disembedding Risk

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Evaluating Modernism Modernity
• Privileging of rational over the irrational
  (emotional)
• Precise language, categorisation and meaning
• Liberation from superstition and tradition
• Facilitates order/predictability
• Focus on understanding/discovery
• Technological/scientific (including medical)
  advancement, production, economic expansion and
  improved living standards. BUT

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Devalues/constrains emotional experience
• Constrains individual autonomy and spontaneity
  through disciplinary society rational control
  and surveillance
• Marginalizes minority/non-Western forms of
  knowledge
• Moral inadequacy- role of rationality in
  colonialism, imperialism, social inequality,
  world wars and genocide (holocaust)
• Produces environmental degradation/increased risk
  (scientific failure and technological dystopia)

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Lecture 2
• Postmodernism This term means nothing use it
  on all possible occasions (anon).
• Criticises assumptions of modern thought and
  modern rationality heralds the decline of the
  modern project and modern society and the
  emergence of a new form of society -
  postmodernity.

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Postmodernists Reject
• a) Enlightenment project of achieving progress
  through reason
• b) The belief in single all encompassing truths
  meta-narratives
• c) The privileged status of reason/mind over
  emotion, sentiment, intuition, mysticism and
  body. (Romanticism?)

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• d) Pre-given boundaries between things, ideas and
  experiences
• e) Categorization of experience
• f) Objective knowledge
• f) The intellectual marginalization of particular
  sets of ideas, ways of life etc.

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Michel Foucault (Post-Structuralist)
• Power/Knowledge (influence of Nietzsche)
• Language Discourse (influence of Saussure)
• Impossibility of Objective Knowledge/Truth
• History as directionless not progressive
• Professionalism Expertise
• Surveillance, Control Bio-Power

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Jacques Derrida (Post-Structuralist)
• Instability of Meaning privileging of
  difference, inversion and ambiguity over
  authoritative (modern) classification/categorizati
  on
• Deconstruction all texts (ideas, actions) open
  to as many interpretations as there are
  interpreters no definitive reading

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Jean-François Lyotard
• End of Grand Narratives (decline in belief in
  progress)
• Legitimacy (scientific, and others forms,
  achieved through presentation rather than
  substance)
• De-realization

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Jean Baudrillard
• Simulation consumerism and the mass media
  engage in a proliferation of signs that are
  increasingly detached from any underlying reality
• Hyperreality

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Zigmunt Baumann
• The Holocaust - consequences of rational social
  engineering, instrumental calculation and
  bureaucratic organization
• Liquid Modernity - Late (post) modernity
  solid features of modern self and society
  dissolve amid flux an flow of complex consumer
  society selfhood is chosen from the
  supermarket of identities
• Legislators and Interpreters

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Postmodern Society (Postmodernity)
• Individualism (multiple/performative self)
• Superficiality/Pastiche/Play
• Disorder Flux
• Anti-Science
• No privileged standpoint all traditions,
  beliefs equally valid

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Postmodern Society (Postmodernity)
• Fragmentation
• De-industrialisation
• Disorganisation
• Relativism
• Post-Fordism/Consumerism/Flexibility
• Pessimism/anxiety, stress and doubt

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Evaluating Postmodern Postmodernity
• Provides critical evaluation of modernity and
  modern thought
• Draws attention to the dehumanising and
  irrational features of modern rational
  organisation (not exclusive in this see Marx,
  Weber, Simmel, Ritzer etc.)
• Challenges the ethno-centric assumptions of
  Western rationalism
• Draws attention to the increasingly artificial,
  superficial and mythical nature of contemporary
  culture and lived environment. BUT

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• Relativism/Radical Constructionism If there is
  no privileged standpoint, and no possibility of
  objective knowledge, then why postmodern theory?
• Also if all perspectives/versions of reality
  are equally valid then medical doctor witch
  doctor?
• Tendency towards solipsism view that nothing is
  verifiable beyond ones own experience
  potential for triviality, fatalism and even
  nihilism.
• No recipe/hope for social advancement/improvement
  criteria for judgement of ideas, values, morality
• Anomie and meaninglessness
• Just Babel? Pretentious Irrational Nonsense
  (Chomsky, Sokal etc.)

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Modernity and Social Theory SO3523

• End of Meta-narratives?
• What about -
• Globalization
• Neo-liberalism
• Liberal Democracy
• Religion (Secularization or Desecularization?)