The Postmodern Condition: A report on Knowledge

Author Jean-Francois Lyotard gives us a fascinating glimpse into the postmodern condition which simplifying to the "extreme is a incredulity toward meta narrative." Though his target is communism--marxism in fact, any particular "narrative" ideology or viewpoint may get its back up when confronted with the claims of Lyotard's discussion here. Christianity, Freudism, Judaism, New Age Ophisms, are certainly "narrative" worldviews, for instance which may ironically find a common enemy in postmodern philosophy.

But it occurs to me that their fear is un-founded. Postmodernism at its core remains for me a rhetorical tool, that does not describe reality, since postmodernism is itself narrative in its description, but it can help illuminate other directions and currents. Language Games--Lyotard's trope relying upon Wittgenstein's Tractatus remind us of the limitations of language in dealing with, and describing the human condition. Lyotard is convincing, and difficult to refute, but in the end his words are relying upon narrative tradition, a weakness he continually addresses in the book--perhaps not to even his total satisfaction.

All words are narratives, relying on tradition. Are we too complicated then for the words we chain ourselves to? My suspicion is that we are, though words are also powerful tools which can accurately convey what we want from one another. They cannot always describe our purpose and true meaning, which to me rests in the fields of the arts, poetry, music, and perhaps religion. It occurs to me that Lyotard exposes unwittingly that Philosophy has reduced itself to the reductionism of postmodernism and must come full circle again to refocus its energies on the other humanities in order to speak to us.

All religions are narratives, and are imperfect in describing our human experience, yet it would be naive to suggest that people don't find meaning in them anyways. Lyotard is a thoughtful atheist, and I am moved by his philosophy, though I feel that a proper aesthetic can reduce postmodernism to a mere rhetoric, and not an over-arching ideology--which it seeks to continually disrupt.