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The Politics of Postmodernism

01 Jan 1989-
TL;DR: In this article, the postmodernist representation is de-naturalized the natural, Photographic discourse, Telling Stories: fiction and history, Re-presenting the past: 'total history' de-totalized, Knowing the past in the present, The archive as text.
Abstract: General editor's preface. Acknowledgements. 1. Representing the postmodern: What is postmodernism? Representation and its politics, Whose postmodernism? Postmodernity, postmodernism, and modernism. 2. Postmodernist representation: De-naturalizing the natural, Photographic discourse, Telling Stories: fiction and history. 3. Re-presenting the past: 'Total history' de-totalized, Knowing the past in the present, The archive as text. 4. The politics of parody: Parodic postmodern representation, Double-coded politics, Postmodern film? 5. Text/image border tensions: The paradoxes of photography, The ideological arena of photo-graphy, The politics of address 6. Postmodernism and feminisms: Politicizing desire, Feminist postmodernist parody, The private and the public. Concluding note: some directed reading. Bibliography. Index.
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Journal ArticleDOI
Shuqin Cui1
TL;DR: In this paper, the concept of the pregnant body has been explored in Chinese art, and Yu Hong's Witness to Growth and Xing Danwen's Born with the Revolution have been used.
Abstract: Until recently unprecedented or considered “impossible” in the Chinese art tradition, the female nude, especially the pregnant nude, has become an intimate, controversial subject in women’s art practice.1 Why the pregnant body emerged as a subject, how it has been articulated, and how one can interpret representations of the pregnant woman are central concerns in this article. The concept of the nude and its absence in the Chinese art tradition is a contested topic in art history. Viewed from a Western perspective, Chinese art has traditionally shown scant interest in the nude as subject or medium. One explanation is that Chinese art originated apart from the Greek tradition and its emphasis on the essence of form and eternal beauty, arising instead from a belief in energy transformation and internal coherence. John Hay, for example, observes that East Asian art provides “very few examples and no obvious tradition of representing the nude.” He asks, “Why does the body seem to be almost invisible in a figurative tradition that flourished for over two thousand years?”2 To continue the exploration, I argue that the absence of the nude results not only from the different orientations of art traditions in the West and China but also from gender hierarchies and sociocultural conventions evident in perception and representation. This article first examines how Yu Hong’s Witness to Growth and Xing Danwen’s Born with the Revolution use the pregnant body

2 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In Calvino's works, the best fruits of contemporary scientific and anthropological disciplines become transferred to the field of literature, and challenge existing generic conventions in different... as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: In Calvino’s works, the best fruits of contemporary scientific and anthropological disciplines become transferred to the field of literature, and challenge existing generic conventions in different...

2 citations


Cites background from "The Politics of Postmodernism"

  • ...Even more clear in this regard is Linda Hutcheon (2002), in the epilogue of the second edition of her Politics of Postmodernism: ‘‘Let’s say: it’s over....

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  • ...The ironic representation of the past is also the target of Linda Hutcheon’s concept of double-coded politics....

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  • ...Linda Hutcheon (2002) revisited this very debate on modernism and postmodernism in the paragraph ‘Postmodernity, Postmodernism, andModernism’ in The Politics of Postmodernism....

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  • ...years and what I’d like to explore in this epilogue is not only the institutionalization of the postmodern, but its transformation into a kind of generic counter-discourse (Terdiman 1985) of the 1990s, overlapping in its ends and means (but by no means interchangeable) with feminism and postcolonialism, as well as with queer, race and ethnicity theory’’ (Hutcheon, 2002: 166). 27. Jameson had pointed out that Lyotard and Habermas were working from different, legitimating ‘‘narrative archetypes’’: ‘‘one French and (1789) Revolutionary in Kubati 1177...

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Journal Article
TL;DR: The Penelopiad of Atwood as mentioned in this paper is a post-modern satire of the Odyssey, where Atwood reinterpreted the protagonist as a woman of many "twists and turns" and narrated her tale of woe in a witty and invigorating style.
Abstract: Postmodernism is commonly described as incredulity towards metanarratives. A metanarrative is an abstract idea that is thought to be a comprehensive explanation of historical experience or knowledge. It claims to arrive at a single universal truth. But postmodernism undercuts this holistic stance by establishing alternative possibilities for construction of truth. The word "parody" is still tainted with eighteenth century notion of wit and ridicule but coming out of such period limited definitions, parody in postmodern texts can mean witty ridicule as well as intertextuality or ironic quotation. The article analyses Margaret Atwood's novella The Penelopiad, exploring the postmodern conventions of historiographic metafiction and parody. Employing her tongue-in-cheek humour and featuring two centres of consciousness, Atwood subverts the Homeric omniscient narrator. Resurrecting the mysteriously veiled figure of Penelope, Odysseus's wife, who is known for her nobility and constancy, Atwood gives Penelope the narrative voice, telling a widely different tale from the Homeric version.Keywords. Margaret Atwood; The Penelopaid; postmodernism; metanarrativeIntroductionMyths are timeless, larger than life stories that naturalize gender roles through their fixed representations of men and women. One such Greek myth, Odyssey, is the story of noble and constant Penelope, wife of Odysseus "known to the world / for every kind of craft" (Homer 1996: 139). In Homer's myth, while Odysseus, the wanderer, has the talent to deceive and is a persuasive speaker, Penelope is presented as a loyal and trustworthy wife, who keeps the suitors at bay while pretending to weave a shroud for her father-in-law. Margaret Atwood resurrects the long-suffering, mysteriously veiled figure and narrates her tale of woe in a witty and invigorating style that makes us chuckle.Postmodernism is most succinctly described as "incredulity towards metanarratives" by Jean Francois Lyotard which means disbelief or rejection of any holistic or totalizing view. The dominant attitude in postmodernism is scepticism. A postmodern narrative is sceptic of any moral or political judgments because it undermines the validity of any one privileged position or any single truth. No longer relying upon the validity of meta-narratives, it demands alternative possibilities for the construction of truth. Whereas Homer's tale was recited by an omniscient narrator, Atwood features two centres of consciousness (Penelope and the maids) which not only refute or endorse each other's viewpoints but delineate the opinion of two classes of the society: the royalty and the beggar-maids. Atwood's story openly subverts the consensual and conventional patriarchal thinking prevalent in the times of Homer. But even in Homer, Penelope is not a monolithic figure. She is enigmatic till the very end. She is enduring and patient yet an object of suitor's desire and also of her son's suspicions. Although firm in her decision not to remarry, she does feel flattered by the suitor's attentions. When Athena instructs her "to display herself to the suitors, fan their hearts/inflame them more" (1996: 308), she betrays her own longing which lies beneath that calm, unruffled veneer of loyalty to her husband. Although "wary and reserved" (1996: 14), Penelope like Odysseus is a woman of many "twists and turns", as is revealed by Atwood's short fiction. In this paper, we analyse The Penelopiadjds a metafictional historiography and a postmodern parody.Analysis and DiscussionTraditional realism was based on mimesis of an objective truth that was mirrored by language but poststructuralists like Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida reject the possibility of a mimetic reflection of life through art because for them life is as much of a linguistic construct as art itself. For Derrida nothing is outside "text", challenging therefore the separation of literary and historical. …

2 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors present mixed narratives in two structures: the discipline "Foundations of sciences teaching" for elementary/primary school teachers and biology classes given by a public school teacher, with images of the cloning of living creatures, texts written by pedagogy female students.
Abstract: The Deleuzean rhizome aesthetics of knowledge production maximizes the expression of curriculum, understood both as a plot narrative and a visual celebration of our way of seeing the world and being in it. This paper presents mixed narratives in two structures: the discipline "Foundations of sciences teaching" for elementary/primary school teachers and biology classes given by a public school teacher. The composition plan, with images of the cloning of living creatures, texts written by pedagogy female students, my interventions quoting authors and the invention of its presentation format, is an attempt to create a different text that does not imprison or destroy meanings, and thus stays closer to real life experiences.

2 citations