Modernism:
"How can I interpret this world of which I am a part"
And what am I in it?"


scientific method, absolute truth, absolute reality
Plumb the depths in order to understand how things work.:
“in order to understand what is going on in the world, we have to
understand how the inner workings operate.”
Modernism = calculation aesthetic
Postmodernism:
"Which world is this? What is to be done in it?"
Which of my selves is to do it?"


surface over depth, simulation over the real
”Simulation offers us the greatest hope of understanding. When our
world is far too complex for the human mind to build it as a mental
construct from first principles, then it defies human intellect to define
its truth.”
Postmodernism = Simulation aesthetic
Of Exactitude in Science by Jorge Borges
...In that Empire, the craft of Cartography attained such Perfection that the Map of a
Single province covered the space of an entire City, and the Map of the Empire itself an
entire Province. In the course of Time, these Extensive maps were found somehow
wanting, and so the College of Cartographers evolved a Map of the Empire that was of the
same Scale as the Empire and that coincided with it point for point. Less attentive to the
Study of Cartography, succeeding Generations came to judge a map of such Magnitude
cumbersome, and, not without Irreverence, they abandoned it to the Rigours of sun and
Rain. In the western Deserts, tattered Fragments of the Map are still to be found,
Sheltering an occasional Beast or beggar; in the whole Nation, no other relic is left of the
Discipline of Geography.
From Travels of Praiseworthy Men (1658) by J. A. Suarez Miranda
Baudrillard interprets Borges
Baudrillard discusses a fable written by Jorge Borges where cartographers draw a map
in such detail that it ends up exactly covering the real territory of the empire. The map frays as
the empire declines. The reality and the abstraction (map) decline together.
By contrast, today that pairing has disappeared. Abstractions are no longer "the map,
the double, the mirror, or the concept." No longer is there simulation of a "territory, a
referential being, or a substance." Instead, Baudrillard sees a "real without origin or reality"
being generated "by models." This is the hyperreal. In the hyperreal, (referring again to the
Borges fable), the map "precedes the territory." And this map becomes a simulacra, which
"engenders the territory," such as it is.
Jean Baudrillard
Simulacra and Simulations
Excerpted from Jean Baudrillard, Selected Writings, ed. Mark Poster (Stanford;
Stanford University Press, 1988), pp.166-184.
The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth--it is the truth which
conceals that there is none.
Hyperreal and imaginary
Disneyland is a perfect model of all the entangled orders of simulation. To begin with it is
a play of illusions and phantasms: pirates, the frontier, future world, etc. This imaginary
world is supposed to be what makes the operation successful. But, what draws the
crowds is undoubtedly much more the social microcosm, the miniaturized and religious
revelling in real America, in its delights and drawbacks. You park outside, queue up
inside, and are totally abandoned at the exit. In this imaginary world the only
phantasmagoria is in the inherent warmth and affection of the crowd, and in that
aufficiently excessive number of gadgets used there to specifically maintain the
multitudinous affect. The contrast with the absolute solitude of the parking lot - a
veritable concentration camp - is total. Or rather: inside, a whole range of gadgets
magnetize the crowd into direct flows; outside, solitude is directed onto a single gadget:
the automobile. By an extraordinary coincidence (one that undoubtedly belongs to the
peculiar enchantment of this universe), this deep-frozen infantile world happens to have
been conceived and realized by a man who is himself now cryogenized; Walt Disney, who
awaits his resurrection at minus 180 degrees centigrade.
The objective profile of the United States, then, may be traced throughout Disneyland,
even down to the morphology of individuals and the crowd. All its values are exalted
here, in miniature and comic-strip form. Embalmed and pactfied. Whence the possibility
of an ideological analysis of Disneyland (L. Marin does it well in Utopies, jeux d'espaces):
digest of the American way of life, panegyric to American values, idealized transposition
of a contradictory reality. To be sure. But this conceals something else, and that
"ideological" blanket exactly serves to cover over a third-order simulation: Disneyland is
there to conceal the fact that it is the "real" country, all of "real" America, which is
Disneyland (just as prisons are there to conceal the fact that it is the social in its entirety,
in its banal omnipresence, which is carceral). Disneyland is presented as imaginary in
order to make us believe that the rest is real, when in fact all of Los Angeles and the
America surrounding it are no longer real, but of the order of the hyperreal and of
simulation. It is no longer a question of a false representation of reality (ideology), but of
concealing the fact that the real is no longer real, and thus of saving the reality principle.
The Disneyland imaginary is neither true nor false: it is a deterrence machine set up in
order to rejuvenate in reverse the fiction of the real. Whence the debility, the infantile
degeneration of this imaginary. It ~s meant to be an infantile world, in order to make us
believe that the adults are elsewhere, in the "real" world, and to conceal the fact that real
childishness is everywhere, particularly among those adults who go there to act the child
in order to foster illusions of their real childishness.
Moreover, Disneyland is not the only one. Enchanted Village, Magic Mountain, Marine
World: Los Angeles is encircled by these "imaginary stations" which feed reality, realityenergy, to a town whose mystery is precisely that it is nothing more than a network of
endless, unreal circulation: a town of fabulous proportions, but without space or
dimensions. As much as electrical and nuclear power stations, as much as film studios,
this town, which is nothing more than an immense script and a perpetual motion picture,
needs this old imaginary made up of childhood signals and faked phantasms for its
sympathetic nervous system.
…
Hyperreality and simulation are deterrents of every principle and of every objective; they
turn against power this deterrence which is so well utilized for a long time itself. For,
finally, it was capital which was the first to feed throughout its history on the destruction
of every referential, of every human goal, which shattered every ideal distinction
between true and false, good and evil, in order to establish a radical law of equivalence
and exchange, the iron law of its power. It was the first to practice deterrence,
abstraction, disconnection, deterritorialization, etc.; and if it was capital which fostered
reality, the reality principle, it was also the first to liquidate it in the extermination of
every use value, of every real equivalence, of production and wealth, in the very
sensation we have of the unreality of the stakes and the omnipotence of manipulation.
Now, it is this very logic which is today hardened even more against it. And when it
wants to fight this catastrophic spiral by secreting one last glimmer of reality, on which
to found one last glimmer of power, it only multiplies the signs and accelerates the play
of simulation.
As long as it was historically threatened by the real, power risked deterrence and
simulation, disintegrating every contradiction by means of the production of equivalent
signs. When it is threatened today by simulation (the threat of vanishing in the play of
signs), power risks the real, risks crisis, it gambles on remanufacturing artificial, social,
economic, -political stakes. This is a question of life or death for it. But it is too late.
What is Baudrillard saying?

Simulacra: a copy without an original. In The Matrix, there is a computer program called "the matrix"
which is a simulation of the world at the end of the 20th century. That world no longer exists. The real
world is a nuclear wasteland; cities are charred and empty, life on earth is only possible beneath the
surface. But an exact copy exists in the form of a computer program. People are living life in a
simulacra, a copy which is its own reality.

Simulation: a model of the real or the creation of the real through conceptual or "mythological" models
which have no connection or origin in reality. The model becomes the determinant of our perception of
reality, we end up confusing the model for reality.
In a world of hyperreality, the distinctions between real and unreal are blurred. Ronald Reagan becomes a
simulation of politics; Britney Spears is a simulation of pop sex idol; Kurt Cobain a simulation of marginality.
The point Baudrillard is trying to make is that simulations have devoured reality, and that models have taken
"precedence over things." Too much reality has resulted in saturation and explosion. Now, we are looking at an
implosion -- reality and meaning are melting into a nebulous mass of self-reproducing simulation. So there is an
odd chain reaction, whereby simulations have taken over for reality, but now generate nothing but more
simulations.
This "fall" into simulations is exacerbated by the masses and media. The public prefer spectacles to reality. We
would rather go to Disneyworld than to work. When we watch the news, we would rather be entertained than
informed. The consequence of this preference is that reality loses its status, and that the effectiveness of
simulation is greater than the potency of reality.
How real is reality TV? Survivor, The Fifth Wheel, The Real World? How are these simulations of reality?
Baudrillard points out very clearly how our modern culture is contrived of images and other stimulus from media
sources and simulations rather than what is considered real and how it becomes what is real to us by perception.
For instance, we are all familiar with various commercials and other forms of advertising that are creations,
sometimes of non-real visuals and events, to promote products. We see people and places on TV that we have
never been to yet we know them visually as if we had. The simulation is real to us not the real place.
Another and maybe even better example would be how we relate to ancient cultures. Archeologists dig them up
and create simulations of their cultures in museums that we see. We have never seen the real societies and thus
the simulacra of these cultures is what becomes real to us about these cultures. Baudrillard clearly defines how
various things like Disney, multi-media advertising and many other sources have replaced the stimulus of the real
for us and how our media culture has become our reality.
Modernism VS. Postmodernism
The features in the table below are only tendencies, not absolutes. In fact, the tendency to see things in seemingly
obvious, binary, contrasting categories is usually associated with modernism. The tendency to dissolve binary
categories and expose their arbitrary cultural co-dependency is associated with postmodernism.
POSTMODERNISM
 A reaction against rationalism, scientism, or
objectivity of modernism.
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
MODERNISM
Using rational, scientific, logical means to know the
world. Optimism that we can understand and control an
objective world

There is an absolute, universal truth that we can
understand through rationalism and logic.

There is no universal truth. Rationality by itself
does not help us truly understand the world.

Humans are material machines. We live in a purely
physical world. Nothing exists beyond what our senses
perceive.

Suspicious of such dogmatic claims to
knowledge.

Humankind is progressing by using science and reason.

"Progress" is a way to justify the domination by
European culture of other cultures.

Time, history, progress

Culture on Fast Forward: Time and history
replaced by speed, futureness, accelerated
obsolescence.

history as a "narrative of what happened" with a point of
view and cultural/ideological interests.

Postmodern historians and philosophers
question the representation of history and
cultural identities: history as "what 'really'
happened" is from one group's point of view

Faith in "Depth" (meaning, value, content, how things
work) over "Surface" (appearances, the superficial, how
we use things).

Attention to play of surfaces, images, things
mean what we make them mean, no concern for
"depth" but with how things look and respond

"disenchantment with material truth and search for
abstract truth."

"There is no universal truth, abstract or
otherwise."

Faith in the "real" beyond media and representations;
authenticity of "originals"

Hyper-reality, image saturation, simulacra
seem more powerful than the "real"; images
and texts with no prior "original".
"As seen on TV" and "as seen on MTV" are more
powerful than unmediated experience.


TIME LINE
Renaissance and Enlightenment through World War II


GENERAL
Attempt to acheive a unified, coherent world-view from
the fragmentation that defines existence


Post WWII, especially after 1968

Attempt to overturn the distinction between
"high" and "low" culture
High Modernism 1920s & 1930s, following WWI -outmoded political orders and old ways of portraying
the world no longer seemed appropriate or applicable;
reaction against existing order

Eclecticism, a tendency toward parody and selfreference, and a relativism that knows no
ultimate truth; no distinctions between "good"
and "bad"

Classification of the world; order; hierarchy

The way we understand the world is relative; it
depends on our culture, position, class, gender,
age, time period, beliefs, etc.

Mastery and progress Historical development; past
affects present and future. Universalizing Linear (like a
novel) Works of art, science are windows to the truth.

"Localizing", pluralizing Non-linear (like the
Web) Works of art, science are only texts, can
only be understood in themselves.
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CULTURE
High culture vs. low culture -- strictly divided; Only high
culture deserves to be studied, analyzed

Everything's "popular" culture -- it all deserves
to be studied; pluralizing Commodification of
culture -- everything can be bought or sold

Humans are self-governing and free to choose their own
direction

People are the product of their culture and only
imagine they are self-governing.

reality can be discovered through science and can be
expressed abstractly (equations)

"the transformation of reality into images"
(Britney Spears is not a person but an image;
Nike is not about shoes but about an image,
etc.)

Mass culture, mass consumption, mass marketing.

Demassified culture; niche products and
marketing, smaller group identities.


SYMBOLISM
Symbols & meaning: hammer and sickle = world
communism

Symbols drained of meaning: hammer and
sickle in advertising (e.g., beer commercials)
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
ARCHITECTURE
"Form follows function"; Le Corbusier, "machine
aesthetic"; Mies van der Rohe; International style (eg,

Multiple, historical refs.; "playful" mix of styles,
past and present. Las Vegas, Pompidou Center;
Venturi, Robert Stirling
airports): straight, clean lines

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BODY
Clear dichotomy between organic and inorganic, human
and machine


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cyborgian mixing of organic and inorganic,
human and machine and electronic
POLITICS
Big ideas/big, centralized political parties rule

Fragmented ideas, decentralized power;
"micro-politics": interest groups rule (minority
factions, NRA, business groups); Foucault,
"everyone has a little power" TV politics -- clash
of images: "how will it play on the six o'clock
news?"

Door-to-door politics; big rallies

"Late capitalism" rules

Capitalism vs. communism: clash of ideologies "The
Making of the President" Parody: Dr. Strangelove;
Orwell's Animal Farm

"The Selling of the President" Pastiche: Wag
The Dog
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
IDENTITY
Sense of unified, centered self; "individualism," unified
identity.

Sense of fragmentation and decentered self;
multiple, conflicting identities.


ARTS
Artist is creator rather than preserver of culture
Impressionism, Cubism, abstract expressionism,
suprematism (Malevich's "Black Square") "Photograph
never lies" -- photos and video are windows/mirrors of
reality

Artist plays with different styles; aesthetics;
pastiche all-important Pop Art, Dada, montage

Art fights capitalism

Photoshop: photos and video can be altered
completely; montage (where's the reality?) Art
is consumed by capitalism

Art as unique object and finished work authenticated by
artist and validated by agreed upon standards.

Art as process, performance, production,
intertextuality. Art as recycling of culture
authenticated by audience and validated in
subcultures sharing identity with the artist.

Art as one unique object created by a master artist.

Art as copies (Andy Warhol's Factory)
Digital media: there is no distinction between
an original and a copy
Analog media: quality deteriorates the farther removed a
copy is from the original

Seriousness of intention and purpose, middle-class
earnestness.

Play, irony, challenge to official seriousness,
subversion of earnestness.

Sense of clear generic boundaries and wholeness (art,

Hybridity, promiscuous genres, recombinant
music, and literature).
culture, intertextuality, pastiche.


FICTION/LITERATURE
Novel is the dominant form; movies Author determines
meaning; the "canon"; of great works: Shakespeare,
Kafka, Joyce, Some can tell "good" from "bad" -- art
critics important

TV, WWW; Meaning is indeterminate. Thomas
Pynchon, Cathy Acker, William Gibson. Rise in
importance of "popular" culture; we can't tell
good from bad; it's all relative

Interpretation of a text; there is an ultimate meaning
hidden inside master literature

Non-interpretation of a text; there is no
ultimate meaning, instead meaning emerges
from what the audience brings to the text

the book as sufficient bearer of the word; the library as
system for printed knowledge

hypermedia as transcendence of physical limits
of print media; the Web or Net as information
system


MEDIA
Knowledge mastery, attempts to embrace a totality.

Navigation, information management, just-intime knowledge.
The encyclopedia.
The Web.

Broadcast media, centralized oneto-many communications.

Interactive, client-server, distributed, many- tomany media (the Net and Web).

Centering/centeredness,
centralized knowledge.

Dispersal, dissemination,
networked, distributed knowledge