Ohio State University
School of Music
Joseph Natoli and Postmodernism
Notes by Stephanie Adrian
Music 829
May 1, 2000
Natoli, Joseph.
A Primer to Postmodernity.
Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1997.
Web Resources
Natoli Supplement;
Poststructuralism;
Postmodernism;
Michel Foucault;
Jacques Derrida;
Francis Steen's critique
Music, Imagination and Culture
Forward
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Impossible for humans to extract a response independent
of the ways in which we as culture have already
represented that response.
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Postmodernity denies the existence of an external point
of judgement -- it denies objectivity.
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Postmodernity is evident in film, architecture,
drama, photography, TV, fashion, music.
Chapter 1
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Defining postmodernism:
intelligence and reason are cultural constructions;
alternative realities exist on the same planet.
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Tension occurs when "reality frames" clash.
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We live in a vast number of stories about ourselves
and our world.
We haven't been discovering a reality "out there,"
rather we are shaping how we see and how we know.
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We continue to reproduce the world according to
our established ways of knowing.
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Thomas Kuhn
may have initiated this postmodernist/paradigm concept in 1962.
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Modernity tells a story in which reason comes
first whereas postmodernity tells a story
in which stories come before reason.
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"The essence of a postmodern attitude lies in its displacement
and not replacement of other mindsets"
(p. 15).
Chapter 2
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Objects signify according to a frame of reference/frame
of realizing.
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We are able to communicate because our narratives may
intersect.
This is our shared sense of realism.
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The greatest impetus for a shared sense of realism -- economic forces.
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Our "sense of realism" is always a fabrication.
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Postmodern negotiation = breaking free of naive realist
formations of reality and truth.
Chapter 3
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Postmodernity questions modernity's hierarchical aesthetic
ordering.
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"Classics" = valuations which we shift in and out of
according to what culture/social order wishes to preserve.
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In film, the viewer must be able to project himself/herself
into the film somehow in order to give it a good review.
The viewer must have the ability to identify with the
situation in some way.
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Classic realist formula = basic Judeo-Christian ethics,
democratic notions, economic notions of success and failure ...
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"This reconfirmation of your identity and identifying
practices is the carrot you pursue"
-- however this is misdirected -- rather, we should
attempt to break focus from one narrative and attend to
the world differently.
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A naive realist sees that there is only one road to reality
and everyone is on it.
Chapter 4
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The film Citizen Kane searches for truth by
shifting focus/changing lenses;
The film interviews four individuals after the death
of one man -- Charles Foster Kane.
Orson Welles attempts to add up the various perspectives in
order to get a glimpse of who Kane really was.
Instead, Charles Foster Kane appears to be "multiple."
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Obstacle to the journey of truth is the consciousness
of the observer, speaker, writer, etc., (subjectivity).
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Enlightenment Modernism is the belief that
reality and its fundamental truths can be captured/accurately
and full understood.
Chapter 5
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Is this a postmodernist world?
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World is the mix of consciousness and reality -- the
two "mutually sculpt each other".
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Postmodernity is a product of culture wars;
society is increasingly hetergeneous.
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Modernity states that knowledge can be derived
independent of subjectivity
and that language is an innocent tool.
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Other concepts: the self,
the global market, post-structuralism, time.
Chapter 6
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Political struggle-conversation between different factions
discussing postmodernism:
postmodernist, progressive, feminist, conservative, leftist, third world
Chapter 7
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Disenchantment as a result of postmodernism as applied
to economics and consumerism -- a "problematizing force",
a virus
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Cultural war about what things mean and how they're to be valued
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Postmodernism leads to a quick transition through fads/fashions
-- good for a globally competitive market
Chapter 8
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Pure science (not practical, no market value) competes
with market-oriented science/technology for funding
Chapter 9
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Postmodern ethics and religion -- moral reality is
a product of cultural relationships -- "Who's to say
what's right these days?" -- values in motion
Chapter 10
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History's stories and conventions are constantly being
re-evaluated by the new meanings and values of the present
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There are countless accounts of the past due to a multitude
of divergent perceptions and divergent realities
Chapter 11
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How does one go about doing cultural studies?