Postmodernism can be understood as a philosophy that is characterised by concepts such as RE-IMAGINING, PASTICHE, PARODY, COPY, BRICOLAGE. It’s an approach towards understanding, knowledge, life, being, art, technology, culture, sociology, philosophy, politics and history that is REFERENTIAL – in that it often refers to and often copies other things in order to understand itself.
Parody v Pastiche
pastiche is a work of art, drama, literature, music, or architecture that imitates the work of a previous artist
this is your standard thriller/detective
parody is a work or performance that imitates another work or performance with ridicule or irony
surface signs, gestures & play
A good place to look for illustrations of postmodern culture, in terms of media studies, is the music video. As Shuker notes, two points are frequently made about music videos: ‘their preoccupation with visual style, and associated with this, their status as key exemplars of ‘postmodern’ texts.’ (2001:167). Shuker refers Fredric Jameson’s (1984) notion of the ‘metanarrative’ (discussed in more detail below) that ’embody the postmodern condition’ (168). For example, the fragmentary, decentred nature of music videos that break up traditional understandings of time and space so that audiences are ‘no longer able to distinguish ‘fiction’ from ‘reality’, part of the postmodern condition’ (ibid). Alongside their similarity to adverts (essentially the music video is a commercial tool to sell music products) ‘making them part of a blatantly consumerist culture‘ (ibid). And of course, the ‘considerable evidence of pastiche, intertextuality and eclecticism‘ (ibid) which is the focus of this next section.
because there’s so much surface there is worry for the overall meta narrative
Postmodernism
Postmodernism is a way of thinking about culture, philosophy, art and many other things. The term has been used in many different ways at different times, but there are some things in common. Postmodernism says that there is no real truth people can know.
Postmodernism can be seen as a philosophy that is characterised by concepts such as RE-IMAGINING, PASTICHE, PARODY, COPY, BRICOLAGE. or as the dictionary describes it as a late 20th-century style and concept in the arts, architecture, and criticism, which represents a departure from modernism and is characterized by the self-conscious use of earlier styles and conventions, a mixing of different artistic styles and media, and a general distrust of theories.
postmodernism its fragmentry,dentred nature of music video
postmodernism say that we cant tell the difference between fiction and relaity
we live in this part of a blatantly consumerist culture
bricolage relates to the film as its involves the rearrangement of sign
Postmodernism typically criticizes long-held beliefs regarding objective reality, value systems, human nature, and social progress, among other things. For example, Pulp Fiction is a postmodern film for the way it tells the story out of the ordinary, upending our beliefs of how a film should be structured.
Surface and style over substance
if the main focus is the idea of just connecting one product to another, then the focus is superficial, shallow, lacking depth, so ‘in a postmodern world, surfaces and style become the most important defining features of the mass media and popular culture‘ (Strinati: 234)