Postmodernism: The interpretation of culture to give meaning to reality
Postmodernism is the current status quo. It is everything around us. It is a broad term coined in the late 20th century across various disciplines.
From architecture to art and technology, postmodernism illustrated a departure from modernism and the inception of a state of culture where media is produced at such staggering rates that it has crossed boundaries into reality, thereby perpetuating hyperreality.
Hyperreality refers to the condition of being unable to distinguish and differentiate between reality and simulations thereof. This is exemplified more intensively by social media. At the genesis of the 21st century, hyperreality was perpetuated primarily by basic modern media. TV, magazines and movies were the primary advocates of hyperreality. Unrealistic standards of existence were illustrated through these forms of media. In today’s atmosphere, the primary advocate of hyperreality is social media. It heavily blurs the lines separating reality and simulations portraying reality. 58,4% of the world’s population is active on social media. This implies that the advancement of hyperreality is perceived by over half of the world’s population. No wonder we hate ourselves so bad.
In order to get a proper grasp on postmodernism and its relation to culture in terms of giving meaning to reality, it is necessary to have an understanding of pre-modern culture and modernism.
Pre-modern culture had no genuine media such as tv and social media. There was however art, music, and theatre. These disciplines were referred to as high art and included painters, sculptors and writers who made observations of the world in order to make representations guided by their observations. Consequently, pre-modern culture is heavily characterised by religion. Christianity drove art, music, and architecture. It furthermore acted as a compass to determine what was considered wrong, or right and acted as a guide of how people should interact. Jean Baudrillard referred to this grand narrative as an overarching ideology applied to reality through culture. This overarching ideology was primarily religious because such was the cultural atmosphere of the era.
Modernism on the other hand perpetuated the rapid advancement of mass image production through photography, film, and printing. This rapid advancement significantly altered the face of culture. In contrast to pre-modern culture, representations of reality such as images and photos looked a lot more realistic in modern culture as opposed to canvas portrayals of the pre-modern age. The representations enhance the believability of the message being conveyed. Jean Baudrillard referred to these representations as simulations. They simulate reality but are not real. The simulations ended up advancing consumerism, communism, capitalism, science, and technology. In the modern era, the face of culture changed from being religion oriented to having a far more progressive, technological, and scientific face. Modernism rejects pre-modernism through mass production, technological advancement and logic trumping religion via the furtherance of science.
As mentioned earlier, postmodernism is everything around us. In fact, the biggest by product of postmodernism is in your pocket.
Smartphones are an extremely accurate illustration of postmodernism. Every piece of knowledge you could ever intend to attain is accessible quite literally in your pocket. Got to love the postmodern era. The videos we watch on YouTube, the ads we see in our daily lives, the magazines we read (printed or digital), every meme, every Instagram post, every tiktok forms part of postmodernism and are just as real in our lives as the trees and buildings around us. This is the extent of hyperreality in the modern era. Three observations of culture can be made in the modern era, according to Jean Baudrillard. The first is that culture is a product of culture. Our reality, to some extent, is made up of cultural representations everywhere which results in the creation of new cultures being birthed in the form of cultural products being rooted in pre-existing culture. Culture is not as original and monotonous as it was in the pre-modern era due to the existence of media which perpetuates hyperreality and proliferates culture. Take the whole punk culture for example. It began as a music genre originating in the 70s, the beginning of the exodus from the modern era. This culture on its own sprouted subcultures such as cyber-punks, nano-punks, and post-cyber punks. Culture is a product of culture.
The second observation is that postmodernism advocates hyperreality. Hyperreality refers to the condition of being unable to distinguish and differentiate between reality and simulations thereof. This is exemplified more intensively by social media. At the genesis of the 21st century, hyperreality was perpetuated primarily by basic modern media. TV, magazines and movies were the primary advocates of hyperreality. Unrealistic standards of existence were illustrated through these forms of media. In today’s atmosphere, the primary advocate of hyperreality is social media. It heavily blurs the lines separating reality and simulations portraying reality.
The third observation is the prevalence of meaning implosion. Meaning implosion refers to the escalation of sources of media and information. From pseudo journalists on Facebook and Instagram to counterfeit political analysts, critics, and hermits of misinformation on twitter. This amplification of sources of media and information has dismantled the integrity of any information. The questionability of news has reached an all-time high and publication of fake news has become the norm. Such is the extent of hyperreality in the era of postmodernity.
This is Jean Baudrillard
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