We are getting into an interesting area. It is
fascinating and energizing. I enjoy the thread
and follow with interest the disucssion.
It is true that we are in-between two major
epochs. Where exactly we are, it will be possible
to judge after a century. This can be done only
through distancing in history. We can call our
times late Modernity, or we can call them
Post-Modernity. There are no clear boundaries in
the world of ideas and thinking. We all
experience a culture shift. It becomes more
pronounced with each year. However, a back clash
is possible. That is why we need a century. If we
trace human history, there are many periods of
change and they both last decades, and even
centuries, and have a pendulum nature, in and
out, until the final stage takes place. In this
respect it is interesting to trace the diffusion
of Renaissance outside Italy. There are
countries/cultures that resisted for a couple of
centuries and even skipped this stage of cultural
development, entering directly into the next one.
It is interesting to see a map of spreading
cultural ideas through time and to see the dynamics of this process.
The way Post Modernism develops in the last
decades, it appears that we are in the most
politicized paradigmatic epoch ever. May be only
Marxism and National Socialism were more
politicized. However, those developments were
geographically and temporarily limited. The Nazis
were in power for only 12 years. The Marxists
hold a bit more, and we have to see how the
things will develop in China to talk about their end.
The situation with Post Modernism is different
because it has emerged and is taking hold in the
biggest economies in the world. It appears to be
very politicized and it is not clear where this
trend will lead us. It is also extremely
relativistic. Relativism is a favorite approach
to empowerment. However, I already hear about a
back clash. Who knows how things will continue in the next decades.
Post-modern empowerment techniques are very
different from Marxist empowerment techniques.
PoMo emerged in democratic societies and have to
adopt to such environments. That is why the PoMo
methods are different from hard line Marxism. The
Bolsheviks relied on totalitarian environment and
developed different approaches to achieving their
political goals. They needed hierarchy and
monism. They wanted to impose themselves with
physical power. The Post Modernists use the
opportunities of the democratic processes and
take advantage of particular situations and possibilities.
I will stop here because there is too much to
write about this and I am not sure designers want
to listen that talk. It is also going into the
realms of philosophy and cultural studies and I
am risking to get out of my safe grounds.
Kind regards,
Lubomir
At 09:55 PM 8/1/2007, David Sless wrote:
>Hi Jerry and keith,
>
>I'm delighted that what I have said strikes a chord. But I want to
>both agree and disagree with you both, but for quite different reasons.
>
>On 02/08/2007, at 8:20 AM, Jerry Diethelm wrote:
>
>>It just seems to me that the consequences of being embedded,
>>situated and
>>de-centered are more apparent today because of our postmodern
>>awareness.
>
>I cannot speak for others, but my own experience of the 'post modern'
>was unrewarding. For some 10 years from 1975 to 85 I steeped myself
>in the post modern, read everything I could in the oeuvre. I spent
>one of those years at the Centre for Cultural Studies at Birmingham
>University with Stuart Hall and colleagues listening to the
>discussions, and participating in some of them. The outcome of that
>period was my book 'In search of semiotics'. Some would say that with
>that book I not only threw out the baby and the bath water, but the
>bath too! I remain unrepentant.
>
>I'd like to point to four much more accessible texts, that preceded
>the post modern, which shaped my thinking about being embedded.
>
>Abercrombie M L J 1960. The Anatomy of Judgment. London: Hutchinson.
>
>Winch, P 1958. The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to
>Philosophy.
>London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
>
>Evans-Pritchard E 1937. Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the
>Azande. London: Faber and Faber.
>
>Dahrendorf R 1959. Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society.
>Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
>
>I commend them to you.
>
>I would argue that the post-modern has added little to the insights
>already present in these works, other than a highly mannered
>obscurantist and obfuscatory form of writing that itself is a
>reinvention of the worst forms of medieaval scolasticism and hermetic
>thinking. (But that's just my point of view). I could say a great
>deal more about the post-modern, but I've had my turn. Keith sums it
>up well with his phrase 'post-modern posing'
>
>On 02/08/2007, at 9:03 AM, Keith Russell wrote:
>>The awareness of being embedded, the apprehension of being situated,
>>the consciousness of being de-centered - these are all significant
>>experiential achievements that are rare.
>
>I hope this is not the case, Keith, because we are in the business of
>teaching rather than hanging about waiting for the rare genetic
>mutation that lands a genius amongst us mere mortals.
>
>I can point to a number of information designers and others I regard
>as friends and colleagues (and intellectuals) who I would describe as
>having an awareness of being 'embedded', and they practice their
>craft accordingly.
>
>I can sometimes pinpoint the moment when students, and others, come
>to a realisation—a moment of epifeny—that they are seeing the world
>from an embedded position. This often happens to design students and
>designers when they undertake diagnostic testing of their own designs
>for the first time.
>
>I could elaborate on this much more, but in the present context, I
>just want to suggest that this is something that can be taught and
>learnt from appropriate experience. If I did not believe that, I'd go
>back to romanticism and await the coming of the next design hero to
>emerge from the evolutionary swamp.
>
>David
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