Introduction to Critical Theory

Becky Opsata

Modernity

The Age of Enlightenment (1600-1800)

Industrial Revolution (1800’s)

Great societal upheaval

Mobility of labor, alienation of labor

Technological changes, media and transport

Birth of the nation-state

The impact of alienation of labor

What technology brings to you: country kareoke

Modern Dance: D1 gets down at the NDT

Modernity

1) Replacement of religion with science and reason

2) Belief in rational self as individuals that have “rights”

3) Belief in coherent society and grand narratives

4) Creation of the nation state

Adam believes he has individual rights, but oh is he wrong

Transition from Modernism to Post Modernism as exemplified

in Art

The Old Masters and Classical Painting

Albrect 1570

Botecelli 1370

Bronzino 1550

Canal 1735

Raphael

Old Master/Renaissance Style

Characteristics of this type of painting??

Next: Impressionism

Picasso 1907

Picasso

Cezanne

Monet

Van Gogh

Early 1900’s - Impressionism

• Characteristics of this type of painting?

Next: Abstraction

Klee

Pollock

Rauchenberg

Abstraction Taken to the Extreme

Duchamp 1917

Duchamp 1951

Manzoni 1962

Kosuth – 1986 (Text is Freud)

Kosuth 1989

Lewitt – 1971 – “4 Cubes”

Kosuth 1989

Sue and Sylvia: Abstraction Taken to the Extreme

Morris 1965 “Untitled - Beams

Abstraction

What is characteristic of this type of art?

Art Transitioned from Modern to Postmodern

1) Old Masters = represents reality

2) Cubism, Impressionism = Crisis in representation of reality

3) Abstraction = presents the unpresentable

4) Non-presentation/Avant-Garde questions who makes art and who can say what is “art”

Debate Transitioned from Modern to Postmodern

The DA

The Critique

The Performance

Re-Occurring Questions of Postmodernism

1) Representation of Reality – what is real?

There is no absolute, universal truth of reality.

Baudrillard

Re-occurring questions of postmodernism

2) Legitimacy and Power – who has the right to decide what is “real” and “normal”

Who says what is normal?

What is normal?

In Sum,

PoMo is a critique of universal claims.

It believes there is not one truth, but there are multiple ways of representing/presenting the world.

It discusses power relations – who has it and why.

Key PoMo Concepts

1) Structuralism/post-structuralism(The birth of critical theory comes from

Linguistics.)Sturcturalism:DeSaussure & Levi-Strauss in the late 1800’s-

early 1900’s. Looked for structure in language.

Poststructuralism: Language is arbitrary and socially created.

Discussing the meaning of words

Keys

2) Deconstruction

Derrida

There is nothing outside of the text

http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~dclark/ClarkrememberingJD.htm

Deconstruct This

Keys

3) Foucault

Power/Knowledge – the second main question of PoMo

Foucault’s Panopticon(Bentham)

Foucault’s Archeology/Genealogy

Genealogy

Keys

4) Marxists/Critiques of Capitalism/Critiques of development/Commodification

Gramsci/Althusser

Frankfort School: Horkeimer/Adorno/Benajmin

Keys

5) Postmodern Feminism

Critiques of power and otherizing

Liberal feminism, eco-feminism, and other

Keys

6) Post-colonialism

Consequences of Western expansion

Said/Bhabba/Mohanty

Keys

7) Feminist International Relations

Critiques of the state (borders/gendered), of power decision-makers in the nation state, and security.

Tickner

Keys

8) Language critiques like: Nuclearism, threat construction, disaster porn

9) Critiques of the problem-solution mindset (Spanos)

Threat Construction

Critiques of Critical Theory

1) Unacceptable epistemic relativismBelief that there is no truth and that society is constructed is wrong and dangerous.

 2) Is nihilistic without any values or ethical

standards for what is right 3) Destructive of human identity, there is a core to

humans, the western idea of rights is good

Critiques

4) No solvency, creates an endless cycle

5) elitist/ivory tower

Review of the 2 Main Questions of Postmodernism

1) Representation of Reality

2) Legitimacy and Power – who has the right to say what is real