Moderna in globalizacija

Vprašanje o globalizaciji ostaja konec koncev tesno povezano s plodovito debato o moderni dobi in umetniškem modernizmu ter njunih individualnih zgodovinskih smereh. Na tem mestu moramo priznati, da se politični in kulturni razvoj 90. let 20. stoletja ni pretirano oziral na samozavestne napovedi postmodernistov, da se moderna zaključuje, kaj šele na zmagoslavne trditve o koncu zgodovine (Fukuyama [1992]*). Pomagalo ni niti enačenje moderne in včasih celo modernizma s fašizmom, totalitarizmom in genocidom. Prav nasprotno, moderna je danes (in je bila že lep čas) povsod in diskurz o postmoderni se zdi samo kot epizoda (četudi pomembna) znotraj neke vrste transformacije Zahodne moderne same. Problem ni več nasprotje med moderno in postmoderno, pa čeprav je to neizbežno poenostavljeno nasprotje še vedno osnova večine trenutno priljubljenega proti-modernega mišljenja, ki izhaja iz ozkega razumevanja postkolonialnih metod. Ampak je problem to, kar je Arjun Appadurai** poimenoval moderna-za-vse [modernity-at-large] in kar so nekateri opisali kot alternativne moderne: »[Moderna] ni prišla hitro, ampak počasi, korak za korakom, znotraj longue durée – prebujena s stikom; prinesena s trgovino; uvajali so jo imperiji in nosila je kolonialistični podpis; gnal jo je nacionalizem; in danes jo vse večkrat upravljajo globalni mediji, migracija in kapital« (Gaonkar [1999]***, 1). 

Andreas Huyssen: Modernism at Large. V: Astradur Eysteinsson & Vivian Liska (eds.): Modernism. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company 2007; str. 57

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After all, the issue of globalization remains very much tied up with the rich debate about modernity and aesthetic modernism and their respective historical trajectories. And here we need to acknowledge that the political and cultural developments of the 1990s have not been kind to the postmodernists’ confident prediction that modernity was at an end, let alone the even more triumphalist claim that history had ended (Fukuyama [1992]). Nor has the equation of modernity and sometimes even modernism with fascism, totalitarianism, and genocide been very helpful. On the contrary, modernity is now (and has been for some time) everywhere, and the discourse of postmodernity seems only an episode (if a significant one) within a certain transformation of Western modernity itself. The issue is no longer modernity versus postmodernity, even though this inevitably reductive binary still underlies much of the currently popular anti-modernity thinking that emerges from a narrowly understood postcolonial approach. The issue is rather what Arjun Appadurai has identified as modernity-at-large, and what others have described as alternative modernities. As Dilip Gaonkar wrote in a recent special issue of Public Culture on alternative modernities: “It [modernity] has arrived not suddenly but slowly, bit by bit, over the longue durée — awakened by contact; transported through commerce; administered by empires, bearing colonial inscriptions; propelled by nationalism; and now increasingly steered by global media, migration, and capital”(Gaonkar [1999], 1).

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* Frances Fukuyama. 1992. The End of History and the Last Man. New York: Free Press. Knjiga je v pdf-ju dosegljiva tukaj.

** Arjun Appadurai. 1996. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis, London: Minnesota University Press. Knjiga je v celoti dosegljiva preko aplikacije Google Knjige: tukaj.

*** Dilip Gaonkar (ed.). 1999. On Alternative Modernities. Public Culture. 11.1: 1–18. Knjiga je v celoti dosegljiva preko aplikacije Google Knjige: tukaj.

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P.S.

Če ve kdo za kak boljši/ustreznejši/uveljavljen prevod izraza "modernity-at-large", naj mi, prosim, javi. Tudi za kakšne druge popravke tistih, ki ste vešči angleščine, se priporočam. Pa hvala za branje oziroma spremljanje.

Postmodernizem modernizma

Sanford Schwartz v eseju Postmodernizem modernizma, enem temeljnih prispevkov na to temo, izpostavlja, da »obstoječa delitev na moderno in postmoderno ni nič drugega kot "razpolovljeni modernizem" in to, kar imamo za postmoderno, je zgolj pozabljena plat modernizma (Schwartz [1998], 16*). Obenem pa Schwartz upravičeno zavrača opustitev meja med obema pojmoma. Njegovo mnenje je namreč, da lahko njuno kompleksno razmerje razumemo kot nekaj produktivnega.

Če nanju pogledamo z različnih zornih kotov, se pojma zdita naravnost nezdružljiva. Rešitev problema med drugim še dodatno zamegljuje obremenjeno razmerje med modernizmom v umetnosti in različnimi tehničnimi, družbenimi in teoretičnimi nosilci Zahodne moderne. Medtem ko tisti, ki se osredotočajo na literaturo, modernizem dojemajo kot kulturno tvorbo, ki nasprotuje analitično-referenčnim modelom dominantnega Zahodnega racionalizma, drugi raziskovalci, posebno znotraj družbenih ved, pa tudi mnogi zgodovinarji in filozofi, s konceptom »modernizem« označujejo natančno te velike pripovedi in družbene modele. V teh krogih teoretične poskuse razgaljanja tovrstnih pripovedi in modelov – ki so jih v literarni vedi in v nekaterih drugih vejah humanistike prej imenovali za poststrukturalistične – imenujejo za »postmodernistične« in zanje veljajo za moteče [disruptive] na podoben način kot modernizem v umetnosti v odnosu do družbene moderne. Kot da to še ni dovolj, tudi literarna veda, ki je »postmodernizem« prvotno uporabljala kot estetsko kategorijo, termin vse bolj odpira za prej omenjene pomene, to je, ga zdaj uporablja tudi kot opis teoretičnih in filozofskih smeri (in kot tak je na nek način požrl koncept poststrukturalizma).     

Astradur Eysteinsson & Vivian Liska: Introduction: Approaching Modernism. V: Astradur Eysteinsson & Vivian Liska (eds.): Modernism. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company 2007; str. 3

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In a seminal essay on this issue entitled “The Postmodernity of Modernism,” Sanford Schwartz points out that “the prevailing division between modern and postmodern is simply ‘modernism cut in half,’ and what we call the postmodern is nothing other than the forgotten side of modernism” (Schwartz [1998], 16). But Schwartz also rightfully rejects the dissolution of the boundaries between the two terms. Instead, he argues that the complex relationship between the two can be made productive.

Observed from certain vantage points, the two terms may seem quite incompatible. The issue tends to be obfuscated, among other things, by the charged relations between aesthetic modernism and the various technical, social and theoretical vehicles of Western modernity. While critics who focus on literature often see modernism as a cultural formation that moves counter to the analytico-referential models of dominant Western rationality, other scholars, especially those within the social sciences, but also many historians and philosophers, in fact use the concept of “modernism” to label precisely these master narratives and social models. Critical attempts to dismantle such narratives and models — which in literary studies and some other branches of the humanities used to be called poststructuralist— are termed “postmodernist” in these camps and seen as disruptive in much the same way as aesthetic modernism tackling social modernity. To make matters even more complicated, literary studies, which initially used "postmodernism" as an aesthetic category, have increasingly opened the term to the aforementioned meaning, that is, it is now being used also as a term for critical and philosophical currents (and as such it has in a sense swallowed up the concept of poststructuralism).

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* citirano po: Sanford Schwartz. 1998. The Postmodernity of Modernism. TheFuture of Modernism. Ed. by Hugh Witemeyer. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. 9–31.