I love this channel for two reasons. 1. When I’m paying attention, I get a very interesting video about philosophy in a format similar to college lectures I love attending. 2. If I want to sleep, it is fantastic for that too. And I this isn’t even an insult or mockery, I’m legitimately thankful for these videos
I love it simply because it's filling in so many gaps I couldn't bridge with all the dense theory I was required to read. Definitely could've used this channel five years ago. It's almost enough to make me want to go back to acadaemia again.
Great video! This is one I comeback to often. Though, if I can critique one thing: I do not think you have to accept a teleological theory of history to be a Marxist. You can accept and apply dialectical/historical materialist concepts (modes of production, relations of production, contradiction, etc.) without also accepting the idea that we WILL inevitably get communism.
I reckon addressing Zero Books' video on Post-Modernism might be worthwhile. I feel like you are more knowledgeable on the topic than Douglas Lain is for sure.
Deidilus Velorian In his podcast with a Posadist, he actually mentioned he had not fully read even Capital. I know it shouldn't colour my judgement, I have not read it either, but I think I am safe in saying it should be a pre-requisite if you are an editor for a far left and Marxist publication
This is so clear... • Marxism has probably the most known metanarrative in modern time - meanwhile professor *Peterson* claim neomarxists refuse metanarratives like postmodernism. • Marxism is known from Marx' materialism - meanwhile professor *Peterson* claim neomarxists are idealists. "Idealist" as driven from _ideas_ in contrast to _matter_ and physicalism. Not postmodernism...
See this is what happens when you read one shoddy ass book and make an enemy out of entire branches of philosophy Or anything that you don't understand all that well tbh
My thought is that "postmodern neomarxist" is a really funny label to don (one I am pretty constantly happily donning), but it obviously ironic. However, I do think the world is begging for a more metamodern take on Marx, one that is able to take on more postmodern conceits of perspective/lack of universality (that there is no infallible, objective meta-narrative), as well as embracing the social construction of an explicitly fallible meta-narrative (one not above criticism and regarded as shared rather than universal).
Tbh I agree 100%, but especially with the take on universality. It's also no secret that we don't live in a society of the kind Marxists predicted in the past and aren't Marx's ideas also a product of the material conditions of his time? Let's not stop there, but have Marxism evolve according to the conditions of our time instead.
@@fabiannymands3704 I think that's one of the many possible reasons Marx wrote that infamous "all i know is that I'm not a Marxist" quote that I probably just misquoted. I love Marx but yeah, he wrote it in a certain time and place and our job is to build and evolve, kinda like he did with Hegel.
@@awhodothey So do you have any examples of these neomarxists and their works? Usually when people talk about neomarxism they are talking about modernist theories that extend Marxism (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Marxism). Additionally metamodernism tends to be fairly ill defined (it's usually defined as a reaction to modernism and postmodernism) is more used to describe aesthetics and a cultural condition rather than philosophical theories (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamodernism). However, of there are metamodern neomarxist philosophers, I would be very interested in reading their work.
a favourite transitional Baudrillard of mine is "the Consumer Society: Myths and Structures" which people who are budding PostModernNeoMarxists might find interesting.
QUESTION: Are you familiar with Object-Oriented Ontology (commonly called OOO or "triple O")? At the moment, it's mostly an academic trend, and is popular with many artists, e.g. Björk. But there's some interesting ideas in there which have a lot of leftist applications, especially in the writings of Timothy Morton, who combines Marxism, anarchism, and ecology in eclectic ways. On the surface, OOO is sort of like a non-supernatural version of animism, looking at every thing (object) in the universe as a unique entity with its own unique "point of view". Like Kant's transcendental idealism, it views the objects external to human perception as real - and is a form of realism - albeit disclosed from direct appreciation. But unlike Kant, OOO argues that this is also the case for all other objects. A human is "noumena" to a cat or a tree in the same way trees and cats are noumena to humans. All objects are "withdrawn" from each other, but still fundamentally interconnected underneath apparent divisions. It's a truly anti-anthropocentric philosophy on that level. Žižek attacked it for not centring the human subject, but that's precisely what's good about it, especially if you care about the interests of nonhumans.
"On the surface, OOO is sort of like a non-supernatural version of animism, looking at every thing (object) in the universe as a unique entity with its own unique "point of view". " So is it a kind of pan-psychism/pan-experientialism, or am I misunderstanding?
i find OOO very sterile, for lack of a better word. animism itself is much more interesting to me. everything i've read from OOO has been more eloquently and evocatively expressed by shamans. it is useful but not my kind of tool. ancient knowledges are more active.
@@empiricalmiracle8592 Graham Harman gives a good summary of OOO in the beginning of this recent talk with Zizek ua-cam.com/video/RIQrXlpRGrQ/v-deo.html but my own perception is that "point of view" might imply a consciousness where none might exist, in a cloud for instance. I see an object as interacting by means of a process, but not relational in an ontological way, because if it was exchanging something with another object, then it wouldn't be the original object but something else. It would have something added to it and would be reducible instead of emergent. My own thoughts again, but I see objects as fairly boring...an individual, God, whatever, because they are static more or less and it's the process itself where all the action takes place. The action takes place in the narrow space (edge) where object almost but not quite touch. A part 4 with a look at this would be terrific! PoMo could be seen as a bridge or tool between what was, the Marxist perspective, and what's becoming, the digital world where large entities like mega corporations and states are broken down.
EmpiricalMiracle Not quite. The two are potentially compatible, but one doesn't necessarily imply the other. OOO advocacy of the uniqueness of objects doesn't necessitate inanimate objects being experiential. Likewise, many forms of panpsychism would disagree that objects are withdrawn from each other in the way OOO does.
potbotra They're also full for supernatural nonsense which is contradicted by the natural sciences. There's a lot of poetic value in examining such beliefs, but not much of scientific or even ontological value. Plus, tonnes of shamans are outright frauds, and don't even believe in the things they say or rituals they practice.
A few notes . . . 1. As with anything else in philosophy, few take the time to define terms used in discussions and debates. Doing this, as well as taking the time to read up on the subject, helps to avoid confusion that arises when things are taken out of context. This is, in part, how we got to where we are with "postmoderism" and "Marxism." 2. Especially in France, postmodernism emerged from post-structuralism, which was itself a reaction to and critique of the previous strains of French thought: neo-Hegelianism, phenomenology, Marxism, and structuralism. The totalizing narratives in Hegel and Marx failed to produce what its adherents were hoping for. Phenomenology and structuralism also fell out of favor because, especially as Derrida noted, they were rife with contradictions and were too rooted in the "metaphysics of presence." 3. Sartre remained a Marxist because of his commitment to the early humanist approach of Marx (also something that many would-be critique never take the time to read) and because his original approach with existentialism was that it was humanistic. Read "Existentialism is a Humanism" www.marxists.org/reference/archive/sartre/works/exist/sartre.htm However, he was also critical of the abuses of the USSR at the time. So, he was ambivalent about the approach, but still placed his bets with Marxism. 4. Agreed on the point that, the earlier the work, the easier it is to read -- mainly, because the earlier work often is more rigorous and contains the core tenets of the later thought. This is especially the case with Derrida and Baudrillard, among others. 5. For the Marxist take on postmodernism, read: www.amazon.com/Postmodernism-Cultural-Capitalism-Post-Contemporary-Interventions/dp/0822310902 www.amazon.com/Condition-Postmodernity-Enquiry-Origins-Cultural/dp/0631162941 Indeed, probably more than anyone else, Marxists have been the most critical of postmodern theory because they see it as amorphous, disconnected, and prone to mental masturbation, the last of which is in no way helpful to foster enough critical engagement for productive action to address the adverse consequences of "late" (i.e., state-corporate and globalized) capitalism. On the other hand, Jameson and Harvey, in particular, were perceptive enough to see that pomo was an after-effect of late capitalism. Going back to Marxism itself, those theorists from the 60s and 70s saw that Marxism was increasingly inadequate to address how capitalism morphed into something post-Fordist and survived, instead of collapsing into rubble as had once been predicted. So, what to do with the metanarrative that failed? Ergo, Lyotard and others who came after him. 6. On the subject of Leftism in universities, which is also another boogeyman intertwined with pomo and cultural Marxism, read Rorty's book: www.amazon.com/Achieving-Our-Country-Leftist-Twentieth-Century/dp/0674003128 Quick summary: Since the American Left failed to address, and consequently was battered by, the Vietnam War, it retreated into the universities and then began to occupy itself with things like identity politics, etc. It then became radicalized in the academy, and now we're seeing the fruits of that.
Great video, I'm in it! I disagree about the Frankfurt school. Each thinker was different. Adorno, for example, has some powerful criticisms of Marx. His negative dialectic that refuses to remain with stable definitions of concepts bears more resemblance to 'postmodern' styles than some give him credit for. In fact the left seems to have felt that Adorno wasn't Marxist enough, wasn't oriented enough towards real world action.
That’s kinda cool what you said about the work of several central pomoists being more of toolboxes of concepts than world-views-that effectively means there’s something for most everyone within postmodernism, which is fantastic. I can see why you defend it as much as you do.
I know that it's too late for questions, but I do think it's interesting that nobody has asked or mentioned how postmodernism differs from or relates to postcolonialism. While much of it is perhaps a bit too grounded in geographically specific examples to really discuss the Human Condition as a whole, philosophers like Spivak, Bhabha or Fanon certainly addresses central concepts of how the self is impacted by geopolitical forces. And Edward Said is practically just an adaption of Foucault to apply across cultural boundaries, right? Idk, would love to hear your take on "Can the Subaltern Speak?" or something similar, maybe in a future video. Thanks
So glad youtube recommended me this channel, I've for quite a while now been hearing post modernism thrown around a lot especially in art critique and analysis and it's been a concept that even though I haven't been able to understand it (skimming through wikipedia only makes me ask more questions) I've found it fascinating and appealing to my own thoughts and pondering of the world. These two FAQ videos have cleared up a lot and as soon as I get the time I'll be watching the lecture series you recommended and I'll be looking into some of these books. Thanks a ton for great content and I'm glad I arrived just in time to be hyped for the third video!
It should be noted that the idea of "Cultural Marxism", that is, the idea that you can bring about lasting social change through subversion of traditional institutions is indeed an actual concept, it is just severely misattributed. It doesn't originate in the Frankfurt School, but rather with the Italian communist Antonio Gramsci, who influenced a lot of the student protesters in the sixties. In Germany, we have the phrase "the long march through the institutions", which was coined by student activist Rudi Dutschke. The general idea was, that even though the protesters couldn't achieve the revolution in the short term, they would still win in the long run, because they would one day replace the old guard in positions of power, as teachers, professors, politicians, journalists, etc. If they simply continued their work within the system, while maintaining their class consciousness, they could achieve meaningful change. I'm pointing this out, because the term "Cultural Marxism" leads to a lot of confusion, even among those that are familiar with the ideas of the Frankfurt School, because it doesn't make sense in the context of what these philosophers thought. The only way I can explain this dissonance between label and content, is if there was SOMETHING that COULD be called Cultural Marxism, but isn't (it is instead called Cultural Hegemony: the marxist belief that the ruling class imposes it's values and culture upon the lower classes, thus justifying the status quo. Logically, if you want to abolish the status quo, you would have to change the values and culture of the ruling class first. Who influences culture the most? Intellectuals and artists). Now, Cultural Marxism is an obvious conspiracy theory disguised as an academic term, but that shouldn't stop us from differenciating if someone is a legit antisemite or just confused about the meaning of the term Cultural Marxism. What I mean by this is: If conservatives like Jordan Peterson talk about "leftist academia" they are mostly talking from a gut feeling, which they sometimes unknowingly call Cultural Marxism. It is not constructive to point out again and again that the Frankfurt School did not, in fact, want to destroy Western Civilisation. Rather, we should ask ourselves what these people actually want to talk about, but can't because they lack the concrete language necessary to articulate and differenciate these concepts.
Many Frankfurt school philosophers were for revolution in society and undermining the foundations of Western culture. The foundational document the Dialectic of Enlightenment starts with Ancient Greece and then proceeds to crap all over the history of the West since then. I think criticism is useful and I tend to like the philosophers from the Frankfurt school. The problem with critiquing the west is that you run the risk of regressing to pre “Western” values. Things like individual rights, freedom of speech, movement, religion. These are all good things and by being institutionalized do lead to the emancipation of most people over time. When you throw out all western values by ironically embracing western values, you end up regressing back to oppressive societies. So I’d the west is a process of creating a society that progressively produces more freedom, so much so that at some point people will start attacking the remaining oppressive structures. Theywill make the association that the oppressive structures are inherent in all of western society and thereby destroy the foundations of their newfound freedom. Then the truly tribal and oppressive structures, which seem to be the norm among primates, return and this is what Peterson is raging against. I realize some of the logic might be hard to follow and can try to clarify it but hopefully you get my point. In other words don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. Because YOU are the baby.
@@oaxacachaka seems like you're being overly charitable in your interpretation of peterson's views given that he is explicitly and openly against equality and in favour of brutal "natural" hierarchies.
@@sivsvensk828 I don't see him as for or against hierarchies. He just sees them as natural. This is true if we are just animals but IMO humans are creative and we can make better ways of existing if we try. That's generally where I disagree with Peterson. I agree that hierarchies are natural but humans don't have to simply go along with nature...but trying to override nature or alter it is a risk...so let's acknowledge that and move on. What do you mean he is against equality? As in that some people should have more legal rights than others or that people have different traits?
"undermining western culture" has not been the project of any Marxist, whether Marx, Gramsci, the Frankfurt school, or the Bolsheviks, or any other. Marxism is part of western culture, drawing from Hegel, the English empirical tradition, and from classical English political economy. It doesn't draw from, say, Buddhism or Shintoism.
I actually own the "Critical Theory: A Graphic Guide" book. Keep reading it over and over again. It's so informative and easy to digest. Keep up the good work!
But when reading Marxist theory I do get the strong sense that those ideas could be employed without believing in a teleological conception of history. (Such as Orientalism and Dialectics of Enlightenment)
Fachjargon Many Marxists abandoned the belief in a teleological conception of history and belief in a final goal shortly after the death of Friedrich Engels. They were called "revisionists", and were associated with the ideas of Eduard Bernstein.
Before hearing "neo marxism" from JP, for me it was Monopoly School/ Monthly Review economists like Baran and Sweezy who believed that Marxist economics should be updated/revised to accomodate for an era dominated by Monopoly Capitals (conglomerates) and neo-colonial/imperialist states dominating the accumulation process. For me that was what Neo-Marxism was, economic theories derived from but critiquing/developing Marx and Engels original works for the post modern era.
I think Peterson just looked at all the people who made him angry, and he noticed that many of them cite Marx and many of them cite postmodern thinkers, and he concluded that they must all be in cahoots together.
I would like to read more about Adorno's theories of art that you describe. That fits perfectly with a book that I am working on right now. Thank you greatly for any specific pointers in his works you can give.
I have a questions for your next FAQ what's your subjective opinion on the relationship between Situationism and Post-Modernism. Baudrillard for example, seems to me, primarily to be a Post-Situationist. Many of his major themes such as hyper-reality originate in Society of the Spectacle not Post-Modernism....Also I heard but am not sure if its true both Debord and Baudrillard once attended the same Henri Lefebvre class.
Love your vids. I'm constantly frustrated by "postmodernism" being pulled out to signify evil by the "online left". Seems a pity, cos I'm not convinced these people actually know what they are referring to and there are endless videos of people roundly criticising pm and condemning it to hell, I'm sure plenty of people look no further. To the last (I think) point about neoliberalism, I *might* be wrong about this, but I think foucault was the first person to draw attention to neoliberalism from a critical point of view - at least to it's origins in the 'colloq Walter lippmann' which led to the founding of the montpelerin society which led to neoliberalism! I came across this cos I'm researching lippmann for my dissertation.
Yasos Biba has transcended the cultural paradigms of postmodernism and metamodernism long time ago. He is now in the realm of Yappy Dor, Yagan Don and, of course, Yavas Kategorichiskiprivetstvuyu.
Good call on those graphic guides. I grabbed a handful from Google Store (google books) and have them on my phone. Great fun and not at all dumbed-down.
Hi, just seeing your series, thanks for it. Just a late question about some other critics: Richard Dawkins, Mario Bunge and Daniel Samora on Foucault. How do tou see them?
Great series, however: would you want a native french guy to make an audio library of french thinkers names for you? It sounds challenging, but it's hilarious.
I don't think Postmodernism is as opposed to Critical theory as you make it out to be. Just two examples: Foucault said that if he had discovered Horkheimer earlier, his works would likely have just been a reception of Critical Theory. Habermas also said about Derrida that he was pretty close to the later writings of Adorno. (Habermas was also opposed to the views of Adornos writing, so him having a dispute with Derrida isn't exactly proof of the Frankfurt School as a whole being opposite to them).
It would be good if you had noted on pages where, for instance, Lyotard rejected the Marxist "oppressor vs. oppressed". He still criticized capitalism and was a member of the leftist group "Socialism or barbarism" for a long time. If you look closely, most if not all of the authors associated with postmodernism were leftists: Derrida was a communist and spoke that deconstruction could only exist "in a certain spirit of Marxism", Rorty a social-democrat ("liberal" in the US i.e. leftist), Habermas also a leftist, Gianni Vattimo was even an elected politician of the Italian Communist Party. Foucault criticized capitalism and the family (a Marxist principle since the Communist Manifesto) until the end. Deleuze and Guattari were communists. Jameson, also a leftie. One cannot ignore how 95%+ of all postmodern authors were strongly influenced by or openly Marxists, socialists, communists or leftists in general.
As a Merry Christmas. I thought I would just share my greatest pet film theory: that the original Star Trek film trilogy of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th films are a sci-fi re-telling of Charles Dicken's "A Christmas Carol" with Spock as the Tiny Tim character. It doesn't matter that each successive star trek film wasn't planned in advance - it just makes the whole journey more mystical and serendipitously great. Khan is revealed by the ghost of christmas past. The battle with the klingon's over a dying planet created by man (Genesis) is revealed by the ghost of christmas present. And past, present and future are revealed by the weird thing with the whales stuff in the fourth film (the 2nd film including elements of mody dick). It is generally also understood that they also represent stages in politics and philosophy - the 3rd film is very much existentially inspired (about the individual), while the 2nd film is pre-existential (dialectics), and the fourth film post-existential (post-modern)... ...so (in chronological order) "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one", "The needs of the one outweighed the needs of the many", and "Humpback Whales". Like I kind of just made all that up - but, it seems kinda right? xP But because A Christmas Carol and Star Trek have a shared universe. This does mean that when Tiny Tim (being someone crippled with vulcan like logical abilities with beyond human abilities to read people's minds) wasn't being (existentially) authentic at the end of A Christman Carol when he says "God bless us, every one!" - he was just fulfilling everyone's expectations, including the readers of the story. Tiny Tim was breaking the fourth wall and satirizing Christmas. Yeh. So. Captain Kirk was Scrooge all this time then. A parasocial merry christmas to everyone! XD
What do you think of Moishe Postone’s response to the postmodern critique of Marxism? I find his thesis that Marx doesn’t posit transhistorical categories, and that the categories he deploys in Capital are historically specific yet universalize themselves as capitalism globalizes to be both convincing and empirically accurate. A lot of the postmodern/postcolonial criticisms which I’ve seen miss this point when they emphasize particularly over a “metanarrative” such as Marxism, because like, I’m not sure how you can understand something like the 2008 crisis that well without looking at Marx’s critique of capitalism. I think Postone does a good job of making this really clear.
I hear you I hear you. I'd like to do it someday but just don't know what approach to take, it'd be hard to apply him to some pop cultural phenomenon like with my other videos. I've considered making a video series introducing German philosophical pessimism in general but I don't know if that's the right kind of content for my channel
Thanks for your efforts to disentangle these terms. Btw, while appreciating the dialogue I seriously dislike the way several images (eg of people), and sometimes images of text, are flashed on screen for only one second or less. Giving you time to linger on them would be less distracting and less irritating.
i agree to a great extend, but habermas is not really representational of the broader ideas of the Frankfurt School's critical theory. Adorno does actually share a lot of ideas with postmodern philosophers (that's also why someone like zizek can productively work with and combine theories by, among others, Adorno and Lacan). Adorno rejects the simple teleological ideas of 20th century Marxism (arguably not synonymous with Marx's theory) and identified the failure of this meta-narrative in the atrocities of Ausschwitz. It is true that the Frankfurt School still relies on the methodology of Marx (also of Freud) but they no longer believe in or were at least critical of the notion of a straight-forward socialist revolution (being severe critic of soviet state socialism).
How would you describe the relationship between post-Marxism and postmodernism? From my understanding, it’s Marxism with a post-structuralist bend, and, given Post-structuralism’s association with postmodernism, how would you characterize this overall relationship?
Note for myself: Saul Newman, post-modernism influenced by Max Stirner. Note for everyone else, especially if you like Nietzsche and 19th century philosophy: check out the Unique and Its Property by Max Stirner.
I've opened The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge by Jean-Francois Lyotard tried to search for oppressor, oppressed no matches, I've tried "outdated" few matches but nothing about the division between the oppressor and the oppressed being outdated. Can you narrow down, where in the book he claims that? (I would really like to have the time to read the whole book, but alas)
On topic of "right wing postmodernists": Russian Thinker Alexander Dugin. Although that guy shatters the difference between Right and Left. To explain it in the easiest way possible: From the right wing thought, he takes that basically, pre modern traditional thinking was right. Modernity imposed a "false language" which replaced the right language of tradition with "Scientism". (Basically the view that you can use science to reshape and control the whole world into your idea.) This scientismand technocracy produced totalitarianism and every ideology of modernity, no matter if its communists, fascist or capitalist, is inherently totalitarian because it wants to put a rigid order on the world and wants to destroy everything not fitting within this imposed order. Postmodernity is basically one way to end modernity. The problem with postmodernity is that it also destroys the "logos". (Logos is basically what Plato describes with the realm of ideas and Kabbalists call Aziluth.) Basically destroying the realm of ideas and revealing the absolute chaos underneath. But at the same time, he says in his last chapter, that every group who tried to restore the logos failed and helped the "evil modernity". Thus, trying to rebuild the logos/structure does not work. Instead, the right thing to do is to embrace postmodernity and chaos, because chaos is every possibility. Thus, wanting chaos also implies that in that chaos, a certain limited order can appear. (As well as other kinds of different orders.) Especially what you said about "postmodernity as a toolbox" fits as a description of that guy. He often does not say "This concrete solution I think is the best way to do a thing". Instead, he often basically says for example "look up this concept from Deleuze. This needs to apply in the new society. How you use it is completely up to you". In a strange way, his books aren't really a political ideology (although he calls them that way), but instead a manual about how you can create your own ideology within his framework.
Question: Is Deconstruction usefull to any type of book? Like does that approach helps towards scientific documents? or do other methods exists? Views on Hermeneutics? In fact, does deconstruction/hermenutics help to solve word problems in High School Science/Math?
Colour perception: I know it's not really to do with this video (though I think a contemporary perspective get's you closer to understanding it maybe). I could ramble on about the biology of the brain involved in colour perception - really I could. Or quote some jargon used by computer scientists that I don't really understand. Or perhaps give a physical account of it likely being that processes in the brain we use to construct what we see for ourselves represent a higher level of entropy than the visual information coming into the eye (perhaps the same can be said for the sound coming into our ears as well) - and this probably can be looked at using Guilio Tinoni or David Tse's work (which is a bit beyond me - but is more than about just computational ability as we would think of it being done by a home or lab computer). In one sentance. Is it just best to say that. Visual perception is an Emergent Phenomena? (thinking along the lines of how Phycisist Sean Carroll might use the term in respect to this problem)... Which I guess would be another way of saying "Existence preceeds essense" - though I don't agree with much of existential philosophy that I am aware of (particularly Satre's homophobic "No exit"). Anyway. Cheers :)
I’ve been interested in Peterson’s idea of “postmodern neo Marxism”, so I’ve been picking the brain of my father, a fervent Trump supporter who is smart enough to memorize talking points without questioning them. Here’s what I got: This term is fine for JP to use, even if it is contradictory, because both postmodernists and Marxists are generally not on the right, not conservative, and not Christian. Therefore they can be lumped together simply as “the enemy” or “the opposition”. Any difference between their ideas is a moot point if they need to be destroyed. I don’t know if you’d get such an honest answer from JP or the other UA-cam skeptics, but I think that is an underpinning in the thinking of many of them.
do you really see the need for an ideologe or an ideology to differentiate between groups and their goals if the result of these groups succeeding in their effords would always be opposed to the goals of the ideologe or ideology itself?
Interesting video, however, I have a few objections. Regarding the Frankfurt School Foucault expressively said that he was heavily influenced by books such as the Dialectic of Enlightenment. Indeed Horkheimer and Adorno also criticized bureaucracy, capitalism, technology, mass culture and the monopolization of knowledge. The connection is obvious. Furthermore postmodernism isn't explicitly left-wing as it is just a collection of writings and thoughts that emerged in the mid to late 20th century. Wasn't Jameson critical of the postmodern era exactly due to the fact that he saw it as a reactionary, conservative and capitalist force? Postmodernism is very much in favour of market places were everything and anything can compete (the marketplace of ideas we hear so much about today). The critique of Enlightenment and modernism stemmed from the observation that these two movements had crushed all other modes of thought and created a monolith under which human beings were being crushed. As you point out criticizing constructions that social democrats and democratic left-wingers generally support such as the welfare state is very much part of postmodernism. The welfare state is a bureaucratic normalizing powerhouse that upholds discipline and order. I think many people confuse the writings of Foucault or Derrida with the current postmodern ideology. Today's grand narrative is that there are no grand narratives and everything is relative and nihilistic except it isn't - we believe more than ever before. We are just stuck in an ideology (or episteme) of irony, meta-commentary, hyper self awareness etc - we know that we are dealing with are ideologies, myths and constructions but we go along with it anyway. Everything is done "ironically" which is the epitome of ideology. I think Zizek has written interestingly about this. For those interested in postmodernist philosophy should now turn their focus to this current state of affairs and the present institutions of normalization. I think the crisis of the European Union is very much an example of an monopolizing structure of the modernist age failing in a world of difference. Postmodernism was and is just a way of identifying the way in which history, culture, knowledge and society is being structured, organized, rationalized, presented, criticized. It can be adopted to anything anywhere in any time.
What you don't talk about and I wonder why are all the popular combinations of postmarxist and postmodern theories. When I studied political philosophy in a pretty leftist faculty (Frankfurt) there were many seminars on combining Gramsci, young Marx and even critical theory with postmodern theories. A few names that I remember: Laclau & Mouffe, Alex Demirovic, Stuart Hall. A substantial part of critical international relations theory to name a popular field. You're completely right that materialist, structural and deterministic marxism is not compatible with postmodern theories. These parts of marxist theories just get thrown out. The focus is on I think three main parts: culture, ideology and hegemony. JP isn't very well versed in postmarxist theory but I do agree with him that it is this general philosophical trajectory that lies underneath the social justice activism in universities today. There was a self reflection of leftist thinkers after the RAF grew out of their seminars in the late 60s. The same should happen today with the SJW movement imo.
I think the persons critique was more so about the consequence of the postmodern ripple on the present social constructionist (i hate those two words) frame of mind. Ideas evolve unpredictably as they spread, sometimes due to mistranslation or misinterpretation, but most commonly by interacting with existing ideas and biases in an individuals worldview (this is why a nietzsche can cause a holocaust). I think that its nonsense to argue that, for example, judith butler and the identity politics/gender constructionist movements weren't greatly influenced by postmodern philosophy and it's impact on culture. love the videos btw, just giving my 2 cents
Tbf, some of his takes on post-modernism are spectacularly bad. That's not to say he hasn't other good things to say, but he literally "named and shamed" Derrida and Foucault as crypto-conservatives. 😐 he says they are anti-enlightenment, but if you read Foucault's commentary on Kants "What is enlightenment?" Foucault expressly rejects the idea of talking in terms of pro-/anti-Enlightenment... Habermas also criticises people he considers to be ambivalent towards the enlightenment, but decides not to classify Foucault and Derrida there. Which is odd at best, in my opinion
@@R0DisG0D ah ye, that´s fair enough. I´m not actually hugely familiar with him, but we studied "Modernity as an unfinished project", and it really boiled my piss tbh. of course its also possible that that particular text isn´t neccesarily Habermas' last word on those guys... EDIT: and also probably contributed to a certain disregard for Foucault, Derrida et al in certain circles
It's quite a large piece of work, but if you want to read something worthwhile by him, "Theory Of Communicative Action" is well-worth the read imho (though I am by no means a philosophy expert, just someone reading in their spare time). He explains a lot of sociological groundwork from Weber to Horkheimer/Adorno to Mead to Durkheim to Parsons and offers a theory wich attempts to combine the perspective of the individual and a systemic perspective. His take on rationality is a little simplistic (though not completely naive) and that's where a PoMo perspective could be useful, but the project is nonetheless quite interesting. That's at least my thoughts on Habermas, again not as an expert.
You missed the influence of Heidegger and Arendt on the formulation of postmodern thought. While all of them thanked Heidegger, almost none of them ever referred to Arendt's contribution, which gets revived only with Agamben.
Srijan Butola Can either really be considered postmodern in their thinking? If anything their philosophy points in the opposite direction to the fragmentation and relativism of postmodernism.
@@octavioamaroflores8634 Actually think the rediscovery of Nietzsche in France in particular was rescuing him from a Heideggerian interpretation. i.e. not viewing Nietzsche through a Heideggerian filter. Also, of course, not viewing him through a Nazi filter
@@eoinfagan1620 "There is more truth in Parsifal's formal structure which allows for different historical contextualizations than in its original context. It was Nietzsche, the great critic of Wagner, who was nonetheless the first to perform such a de-contextualization, proposing a new figure of Wagner: no longer Wagner as the poet of Teutonic mythology, of bombastic heroic grandeur, but the "miniaturist" Wagner, the Wagner of hystericized femininity, of delicate passages, of bourgeois family decadence. Along the same lines, Nietzsche was repeatedly reinvented throughout the XXth century, from the conservative-heroic proto-Fascist Nietzsche up to the "French" Nietzsche and the Cultural Studies Nietzsche. Convincing historical analysis can easily show how Nietzsche's theory was embedded in his particular political experience (the "revolt of the slaves" was for him exemplified by the Paris Commune); however, this in no way contradicts the fact that there is more truth in the "decontextualized" French Nietzsche of Deleuze and Foucault than in this "historically accurate" Nietzsche. And the argument is here not simply pragmatic: the point to be made is not that Deleuze's reading of Nietzsche, although "historically inaccurate," is "more productive"; it is rather that the tension between the basic universal frame of Nietzsche's thought and its particular historical contextualization is inscribed into the very edifice of Nietzsche's thought, is part of its very identity, in the same way that the tension between the universal form of human rights and their "true meaning" at the historical moment of their inception is part of their identity." -Zizek
Hey, do PostM think that one (Self), as an existentialist might, can overcome structures without society/culture dismantling at the same time or prior to?
I've got a better metanarrative, which is that PoMo eats itself. You do not have to understand injustice to see it and fight it. You do not have to know how and why your fight will be successful or fail, to fight injustice. Such philosophical understanding is important to some, and can help those who sit in armchairs mobilize the workers. I would not begrudge them their mouth flapping and academic screeding efforts. Sometimes a pebble's ripple in a pond can instigate a tsunami. Sometimes.
"Let deeds, not words, be your adorning." (from _The Hidden Words)_ And again, "Guidance hath ever been given by words, and now it is given by deeds. Everyone must show forth deeds that are pure and holy, for words are the property of all alike, whereas such deeds as these belong only to Our loved ones. Strive then with heart and soul to distinguish yourselves by your deeds."
I am not sure why you would equate eugénisme with the right since eugenism was espoused and promoted also by major thinkers on the left and socialists.
@@el_equidistante Only in reference to others. All these vids and no def, makes me think he/she is avoiding it - I'm guessing at the fear part. Would love to hear CP's take, no other names (including patreon), just CP. So bright.
Technically, the Situationists forwarded their own Marxist form of theorizing capitalism in or as a postmodern condition, they just had their own philosophical terms and concepts for elucidating it.
You differentiate between gender studies and postmodernity. Could you please elaborate on that in a later video? I always thought that the postmodern philosopher Judith Butler has basically created the whole construct of gender studies and the 2 are almost identical. If there are major differences between the 2, I would like to know them.
I believe Mark Fisher was considered more of a Deleuzian than a Marxist in his theory. Definitely a socialist though. Also, Lefebvre has been considered a poststructuralist as well as a Marxist. Bataille and Blanchot too.
Satre isn't really considered a Neo-Marxist? I don't know? - I was literally born yesterday when it comes to philosophy. And I thought it was a natural conclusion that Satre was a Neo-Marxist - maybe not officially. I have once stated before: - "(I am still learning about this second or third hand) I think the irony of many post-humanists or trans-humanists today is that, in terms of psychology, they have either gone backwards from humanistic psychology to the preceeding psycho-analysis of freud and jung in the case of existentialist feminist TERFs and so on of the neo-marxist left, or, back to the preceeding behavioural psychology (i.e "conversion therapy" of LGBTQI people) of B.F. Skinner etc with the Ayn Rand Objectivist Neo-Liberal and cybernetics approaches*. With Atheists of the Manosphere still being in the flawed humanistic psychology camp. Or just your basic neo-feudalist conservative essentialist religious fundamentalist." *which I didn't realise at the time pretty much describes Jordan Peterson
Isn't Post-modernism a _type_ of _intellectual_ anarchism? I mean, you could summarize Post-modernism as "context is everything" (from which you can derive a result like "metanarratives are suspect" very easily), and because we're all individuals, we all have a different context (life experience), which is already in essence a type of rejection of all authority being objective as it doesn't automatically reside in every potential context.
I wouldn't say that. There's already the fact that certain postmodernists are right-wing (as mentioned here) whereas anarchism is a far-left ideology. There's also the fact that Foucault for example viewed power (understood as an ability to influence people around you) as the defining factor to make a certain utterance within a discourse valid, meaning that a lot of discourses and utterances get excluded. Derrida directly said that there's a sort of center for what makes an interpretation valid, and that this is necessary for functioning in a society. I also wouldn't say that "context is everything" sums it up, because several postmodernists would agree that within one context alone there are several networks, theories, and authorities that get measured up against each other within the same discourse, and that certain structures and paradigms give power to an authority that excludes other authorities. Deleuze directly claimed that the concept of an "individual" is dead and that we're now "dividuals", meaning that we're put into certain categories and discursive practices to even contextualize ourselves
I love this channel for two reasons.
1. When I’m paying attention, I get a very interesting video about philosophy in a format similar to college lectures I love attending.
2. If I want to sleep, it is fantastic for that too.
And I this isn’t even an insult or mockery, I’m legitimately thankful for these videos
I love it simply because it's filling in so many gaps I couldn't bridge with all the dense theory I was required to read. Definitely could've used this channel five years ago. It's almost enough to make me want to go back to acadaemia again.
You should make a video on Nick Land/CCRU and Mark Fischer
The only thing we need to now about society is that
WE LIVE IN ONE
What if...
WE LIVE IN TWO?
Im not sure if this is a play on words. If it is, I don’t get it. If it isn’t, it’s “know” not “now”.
when will this meme die
Abhinandan Dutta what if we live in a bunch of societies inside of one society? That's definitely... A SOCIETY
Great video! This is one I comeback to often. Though, if I can critique one thing: I do not think you have to accept a teleological theory of history to be a Marxist. You can accept and apply dialectical/historical materialist concepts (modes of production, relations of production, contradiction, etc.) without also accepting the idea that we WILL inevitably get communism.
I reckon addressing Zero Books' video on Post-Modernism might be worthwhile. I feel like you are more knowledgeable on the topic than Douglas Lain is for sure.
And their video on intersectionality.
Or go on the Zero Books podcast. Lain would definitely engage honestly and openly.
Yea stinky Doug has some seriously weak/reckless takes on the history of philosophy
@Ghost How is intersectionality bullshit?
Deidilus Velorian In his podcast with a Posadist, he actually mentioned he had not fully read even Capital. I know it shouldn't colour my judgement, I have not read it either, but I think I am safe in saying it should be a pre-requisite if you are an editor for a far left and Marxist publication
This is so clear...
• Marxism has probably the most known metanarrative in modern time - meanwhile professor *Peterson* claim neomarxists refuse metanarratives like postmodernism.
• Marxism is known from Marx' materialism - meanwhile professor *Peterson* claim neomarxists are idealists. "Idealist" as driven from _ideas_ in contrast to _matter_ and physicalism. Not postmodernism...
See this is what happens when you read one shoddy ass book and make an enemy out of entire branches of philosophy
Or anything that you don't understand all that well tbh
My thought is that "postmodern neomarxist" is a really funny label to don (one I am pretty constantly happily donning), but it obviously ironic. However, I do think the world is begging for a more metamodern take on Marx, one that is able to take on more postmodern conceits of perspective/lack of universality (that there is no infallible, objective meta-narrative), as well as embracing the social construction of an explicitly fallible meta-narrative (one not above criticism and regarded as shared rather than universal).
Tbh I agree 100%, but especially with the take on universality. It's also no secret that we don't live in a society of the kind Marxists predicted in the past and aren't Marx's ideas also a product of the material conditions of his time? Let's not stop there, but have Marxism evolve according to the conditions of our time instead.
@@fabiannymands3704 I think that's one of the many possible reasons Marx wrote that infamous "all i know is that I'm not a Marxist" quote that I probably just misquoted. I love Marx but yeah, he wrote it in a certain time and place and our job is to build and evolve, kinda like he did with Hegel.
Peter Coffin "I do think the world is begging for a more metamodern take on Marx" That's what neo-marxism is...
This comment is obviously something Postmodernist neomarxobstructionism
@@awhodothey So do you have any examples of these neomarxists and their works? Usually when people talk about neomarxism they are talking about modernist theories that extend Marxism (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Marxism). Additionally metamodernism tends to be fairly ill defined (it's usually defined as a reaction to modernism and postmodernism) is more used to describe aesthetics and a cultural condition rather than philosophical theories (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamodernism). However, of there are metamodern neomarxist philosophers, I would be very interested in reading their work.
a favourite transitional Baudrillard of mine is "the Consumer Society: Myths and Structures" which people who are budding PostModernNeoMarxists might find interesting.
It's amazing how much I
am learning with you. It's like I have just a vague form of an idea and you elaborate on it 10 fold.
I'd like to thank ya for these again. It can be so hard to get a grasp on, you help alot
QUESTION: Are you familiar with Object-Oriented Ontology (commonly called OOO or "triple O")?
At the moment, it's mostly an academic trend, and is popular with many artists, e.g. Björk. But there's some interesting ideas in there which have a lot of leftist applications, especially in the writings of Timothy Morton, who combines Marxism, anarchism, and ecology in eclectic ways.
On the surface, OOO is sort of like a non-supernatural version of animism, looking at every thing (object) in the universe as a unique entity with its own unique "point of view". Like Kant's transcendental idealism, it views the objects external to human perception as real - and is a form of realism - albeit disclosed from direct appreciation. But unlike Kant, OOO argues that this is also the case for all other objects. A human is "noumena" to a cat or a tree in the same way trees and cats are noumena to humans. All objects are "withdrawn" from each other, but still fundamentally interconnected underneath apparent divisions.
It's a truly anti-anthropocentric philosophy on that level. Žižek attacked it for not centring the human subject, but that's precisely what's good about it, especially if you care about the interests of nonhumans.
"On the surface, OOO is sort of like a non-supernatural version of animism, looking at every thing (object) in the universe as a unique entity with its own unique "point of view". "
So is it a kind of pan-psychism/pan-experientialism, or am I misunderstanding?
i find OOO very sterile, for lack of a better word. animism itself is much more interesting to me. everything i've read from OOO has been more eloquently and evocatively expressed by shamans. it is useful but not my kind of tool. ancient knowledges are more active.
@@empiricalmiracle8592 Graham Harman gives a good summary of OOO in the beginning of this recent talk with Zizek ua-cam.com/video/RIQrXlpRGrQ/v-deo.html but my own perception is that "point of view" might imply a consciousness where none might exist, in a cloud for instance. I see an object as interacting by means of a process, but not relational in an ontological way, because if it was exchanging something with another object, then it wouldn't be the original object but something else. It would have something added to it and would be reducible instead of emergent. My own thoughts again, but I see objects as fairly boring...an individual, God, whatever, because they are static more or less and it's the process itself where all the action takes place. The action takes place in the narrow space (edge) where object almost but not quite touch.
A part 4 with a look at this would be terrific! PoMo could be seen as a bridge or tool between what was, the Marxist perspective, and what's becoming, the digital world where large entities like mega corporations and states are broken down.
EmpiricalMiracle
Not quite. The two are potentially compatible, but one doesn't necessarily imply the other.
OOO advocacy of the uniqueness of objects doesn't necessitate inanimate objects being experiential. Likewise, many forms of panpsychism would disagree that objects are withdrawn from each other in the way OOO does.
potbotra
They're also full for supernatural nonsense which is contradicted by the natural sciences.
There's a lot of poetic value in examining such beliefs, but not much of scientific or even ontological value. Plus, tonnes of shamans are outright frauds, and don't even believe in the things they say or rituals they practice.
A few notes . . .
1. As with anything else in philosophy, few take the time to define terms used in discussions and debates. Doing this, as well as taking the time to read up on the subject, helps to avoid confusion that arises when things are taken out of context. This is, in part, how we got to where we are with "postmoderism" and "Marxism."
2. Especially in France, postmodernism emerged from post-structuralism, which was itself a reaction to and critique of the previous strains of French thought: neo-Hegelianism, phenomenology, Marxism, and structuralism. The totalizing narratives in Hegel and Marx failed to produce what its adherents were hoping for. Phenomenology and structuralism also fell out of favor because, especially as Derrida noted, they were rife with contradictions and were too rooted in the "metaphysics of presence."
3. Sartre remained a Marxist because of his commitment to the early humanist approach of Marx (also something that many would-be critique never take the time to read) and because his original approach with existentialism was that it was humanistic.
Read "Existentialism is a Humanism"
www.marxists.org/reference/archive/sartre/works/exist/sartre.htm
However, he was also critical of the abuses of the USSR at the time. So, he was ambivalent about the approach, but still placed his bets with Marxism.
4. Agreed on the point that, the earlier the work, the easier it is to read -- mainly, because the earlier work often is more rigorous and contains the core tenets of the later thought. This is especially the case with Derrida and Baudrillard, among others.
5. For the Marxist take on postmodernism, read:
www.amazon.com/Postmodernism-Cultural-Capitalism-Post-Contemporary-Interventions/dp/0822310902
www.amazon.com/Condition-Postmodernity-Enquiry-Origins-Cultural/dp/0631162941
Indeed, probably more than anyone else, Marxists have been the most critical of postmodern theory because they see it as amorphous, disconnected, and prone to mental masturbation, the last of which is in no way helpful to foster enough critical engagement for productive action to address the adverse consequences of "late" (i.e., state-corporate and globalized) capitalism. On the other hand, Jameson and Harvey, in particular, were perceptive enough to see that pomo was an after-effect of late capitalism. Going back to Marxism itself, those theorists from the 60s and 70s saw that Marxism was increasingly inadequate to address how capitalism morphed into something post-Fordist and survived, instead of collapsing into rubble as had once been predicted. So, what to do with the metanarrative that failed? Ergo, Lyotard and others who came after him.
6. On the subject of Leftism in universities, which is also another boogeyman intertwined with pomo and cultural Marxism, read Rorty's book:
www.amazon.com/Achieving-Our-Country-Leftist-Twentieth-Century/dp/0674003128
Quick summary: Since the American Left failed to address, and consequently was battered by, the Vietnam War, it retreated into the universities and then began to occupy itself with things like identity politics, etc. It then became radicalized in the academy, and now we're seeing the fruits of that.
My question was answered. yay!
Great video, I'm in it! I disagree about the Frankfurt school. Each thinker was different. Adorno, for example, has some powerful criticisms of Marx. His negative dialectic that refuses to remain with stable definitions of concepts bears more resemblance to 'postmodern' styles than some give him credit for. In fact the left seems to have felt that Adorno wasn't Marxist enough, wasn't oriented enough towards real world action.
That’s kinda cool what you said about the work of several central pomoists being more of toolboxes of concepts than world-views-that effectively means there’s something for most everyone within postmodernism, which is fantastic. I can see why you defend it as much as you do.
I know that it's too late for questions, but I do think it's interesting that nobody has asked or mentioned how postmodernism differs from or relates to postcolonialism. While much of it is perhaps a bit too grounded in geographically specific examples to really discuss the Human Condition as a whole, philosophers like Spivak, Bhabha or Fanon certainly addresses central concepts of how the self is impacted by geopolitical forces. And Edward Said is practically just an adaption of Foucault to apply across cultural boundaries, right? Idk, would love to hear your take on "Can the Subaltern Speak?" or something similar, maybe in a future video. Thanks
Always good to see a shout-out to my boy Fredric Jameson.
Todd May!! He’s a very cool guy, even in person :) if you ever get the chance to go to a speaking event of his i recommend it
So glad youtube recommended me this channel, I've for quite a while now been hearing post modernism thrown around a lot especially in art critique and analysis and it's been a concept that even though I haven't been able to understand it (skimming through wikipedia only makes me ask more questions) I've found it fascinating and appealing to my own thoughts and pondering of the world. These two FAQ videos have cleared up a lot and as soon as I get the time I'll be watching the lecture series you recommended and I'll be looking into some of these books. Thanks a ton for great content and I'm glad I arrived just in time to be hyped for the third video!
Name of music at the end? It is sick
I'd like to know it too.
It's actually something I made myself! I could upload it for download somewhere if you'd like
@@jonasceikaCCK Please upload your music! That was such a tease at the end of the video.
Cuck Philosophy yes please do. I enjoyed it as well.
@@jonasceikaCCK Where can we download this track ? It's sounds really nice !
It should be noted that the idea of "Cultural Marxism", that is, the idea that you can bring about lasting social change through subversion of traditional institutions is indeed an actual concept, it is just severely misattributed. It doesn't originate in the Frankfurt School, but rather with the Italian communist Antonio Gramsci, who influenced a lot of the student protesters in the sixties. In Germany, we have the phrase "the long march through the institutions", which was coined by student activist Rudi Dutschke. The general idea was, that even though the protesters couldn't achieve the revolution in the short term, they would still win in the long run, because they would one day replace the old guard in positions of power, as teachers, professors, politicians, journalists, etc. If they simply continued their work within the system, while maintaining their class consciousness, they could achieve meaningful change.
I'm pointing this out, because the term "Cultural Marxism" leads to a lot of confusion, even among those that are familiar with the ideas of the Frankfurt School, because it doesn't make sense in the context of what these philosophers thought. The only way I can explain this dissonance between label and content, is if there was SOMETHING that COULD be called Cultural Marxism, but isn't (it is instead called Cultural Hegemony: the marxist belief that the ruling class imposes it's values and culture upon the lower classes, thus justifying the status quo. Logically, if you want to abolish the status quo, you would have to change the values and culture of the ruling class first. Who influences culture the most? Intellectuals and artists). Now, Cultural Marxism is an obvious conspiracy theory disguised as an academic term, but that shouldn't stop us from differenciating if someone is a legit antisemite or just confused about the meaning of the term Cultural Marxism.
What I mean by this is: If conservatives like Jordan Peterson talk about "leftist academia" they are mostly talking from a gut feeling, which they sometimes unknowingly call Cultural Marxism. It is not constructive to point out again and again that the Frankfurt School did not, in fact, want to destroy Western Civilisation. Rather, we should ask ourselves what these people actually want to talk about, but can't because they lack the concrete language necessary to articulate and differenciate these concepts.
smashwombel this is certainly a fair point for the lay person. Peterson, as an academic, SHOULD know better, however.
Many Frankfurt school philosophers were for revolution in society and undermining the foundations of Western culture. The foundational document the Dialectic of Enlightenment starts with Ancient Greece and then proceeds to crap all over the history of the West since then. I think criticism is useful and I tend to like the philosophers from the Frankfurt school. The problem with critiquing the west is that you run the risk of regressing to pre “Western” values. Things like individual rights, freedom of speech, movement, religion. These are all good things and by being institutionalized do lead to the emancipation of most people over time. When you throw out all western values by ironically embracing western values, you end up regressing back to oppressive societies. So I’d the west is a process of creating a society that progressively produces more freedom, so much so that at some point people will start attacking the remaining oppressive structures. Theywill make the association that the oppressive structures are inherent in all of western society and thereby destroy the foundations of their newfound freedom. Then the truly tribal and oppressive structures, which seem to be the norm among primates, return and this is what Peterson is raging against.
I realize some of the logic might be hard to follow and can try to clarify it but hopefully you get my point.
In other words don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. Because YOU are the baby.
@@oaxacachaka seems like you're being overly charitable in your interpretation of peterson's views given that he is explicitly and openly against equality and in favour of brutal "natural" hierarchies.
@@sivsvensk828
I don't see him as for or against hierarchies. He just sees them as natural. This is true if we are just animals but IMO humans are creative and we can make better ways of existing if we try. That's generally where I disagree with Peterson. I agree that hierarchies are natural but humans don't have to simply go along with nature...but trying to override nature or alter it is a risk...so let's acknowledge that and move on.
What do you mean he is against equality? As in that some people should have more legal rights than others or that people have different traits?
"undermining western culture" has not been the project of any Marxist, whether Marx, Gramsci, the Frankfurt school, or the Bolsheviks, or any other. Marxism is part of western culture, drawing from Hegel, the English empirical tradition, and from classical English political economy. It doesn't draw from, say, Buddhism or Shintoism.
I actually own the "Critical Theory: A Graphic Guide" book. Keep reading it over and over again. It's so informative and easy to digest. Keep up the good work!
But when reading Marxist theory I do get the strong sense that those ideas could be employed without believing in a teleological conception of history.
(Such as Orientalism and Dialectics of Enlightenment)
Fachjargon
Many Marxists abandoned the belief in a teleological conception of history and belief in a final goal shortly after the death of Friedrich Engels.
They were called "revisionists", and were associated with the ideas of Eduard Bernstein.
@@voltairinekropotkin5581 I am going to check him out. Thank you!
Thanks for answering my question, it was clear as water and fast as thunder! Keep the work up!
Before hearing "neo marxism" from JP, for me it was Monopoly School/ Monthly Review economists like Baran and Sweezy who believed that Marxist economics should be updated/revised to accomodate for an era dominated by Monopoly Capitals (conglomerates) and neo-colonial/imperialist states dominating the accumulation process. For me that was what Neo-Marxism was, economic theories derived from but critiquing/developing Marx and Engels original works for the post modern era.
I think Peterson just looked at all the people who made him angry, and he noticed that many of them cite Marx and many of them cite postmodern thinkers, and he concluded that they must all be in cahoots together.
I would like to read more about Adorno's theories of art that you describe. That fits perfectly with a book that I am working on right now. Thank you greatly for any specific pointers in his works you can give.
These FAQ vids are always so helpful
Excellent series by a knowledgeable lecturer.
I have a questions for your next FAQ what's your subjective opinion on the relationship between Situationism and Post-Modernism. Baudrillard for example, seems to me, primarily to be a Post-Situationist. Many of his major themes such as hyper-reality originate in Society of the Spectacle not Post-Modernism....Also I heard but am not sure if its true both Debord and Baudrillard once attended the same Henri Lefebvre class.
Maybe do a video on a critique about foundationalism or verificationism. Love your channel!
I'm a pretty conservative person and I love your videos. Keep up the hard work!
Not for long lol
are you a right-wing postmodernist? if so, I am also
I like this ideology as tool analogy. Some ideologies are useful to describe the world in a certain context.
Love your vids. I'm constantly frustrated by "postmodernism" being pulled out to signify evil by the "online left". Seems a pity, cos I'm not convinced these people actually know what they are referring to and there are endless videos of people roundly criticising pm and condemning it to hell, I'm sure plenty of people look no further. To the last (I think) point about neoliberalism, I *might* be wrong about this, but I think foucault was the first person to draw attention to neoliberalism from a critical point of view - at least to it's origins in the 'colloq Walter lippmann' which led to the founding of the montpelerin society which led to neoliberalism! I came across this cos I'm researching lippmann for my dissertation.
Yasos Biba has transcended the cultural paradigms of postmodernism and metamodernism long time ago. He is now in the realm of Yappy Dor, Yagan Don and, of course, Yavas Kategorichiskiprivetstvuyu.
Good call on those graphic guides. I grabbed a handful from Google Store (google books) and have them on my phone. Great fun and not at all dumbed-down.
4:13 Ron Paul at left
lmao
Hi, just seeing your series, thanks for it. Just a late question about some other critics: Richard Dawkins, Mario Bunge and Daniel Samora on Foucault. How do tou see them?
Great series, however: would you want a native french guy to make an audio library of french thinkers names for you? It sounds challenging, but it's hilarious.
I don't think Postmodernism is as opposed to Critical theory as you make it out to be. Just two examples: Foucault said that if he had discovered Horkheimer earlier, his works would likely have just been a reception of Critical Theory. Habermas also said about Derrida that he was pretty close to the later writings of Adorno. (Habermas was also opposed to the views of Adornos writing, so him having a dispute with Derrida isn't exactly proof of the Frankfurt School as a whole being opposite to them).
Great video. You cover postmodern theorists much better than I do. Your videos are definitely a valuable contribution to the UA-cam community.
Thank for these important clarications
Really grateful for this channel.
It would be good if you had noted on pages where, for instance, Lyotard rejected the Marxist "oppressor vs. oppressed". He still criticized capitalism and was a member of the leftist group "Socialism or barbarism" for a long time. If you look closely, most if not all of the authors associated with postmodernism were leftists: Derrida was a communist and spoke that deconstruction could only exist "in a certain spirit of Marxism", Rorty a social-democrat ("liberal" in the US i.e. leftist), Habermas also a leftist, Gianni Vattimo was even an elected politician of the Italian Communist Party. Foucault criticized capitalism and the family (a Marxist principle since the Communist Manifesto) until the end. Deleuze and Guattari were communists. Jameson, also a leftie. One cannot ignore how 95%+ of all postmodern authors were strongly influenced by or openly Marxists, socialists, communists or leftists in general.
Great series, I'm really enjoying this!
As a Merry Christmas. I thought I would just share my greatest pet film theory: that the original Star Trek film trilogy of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th films are a sci-fi re-telling of Charles Dicken's "A Christmas Carol" with Spock as the Tiny Tim character. It doesn't matter that each successive star trek film wasn't planned in advance - it just makes the whole journey more mystical and serendipitously great.
Khan is revealed by the ghost of christmas past. The battle with the klingon's over a dying planet created by man (Genesis) is revealed by the ghost of christmas present. And past, present and future are revealed by the weird thing with the whales stuff in the fourth film (the 2nd film including elements of mody dick).
It is generally also understood that they also represent stages in politics and philosophy - the 3rd film is very much existentially inspired (about the individual), while the 2nd film is pre-existential (dialectics), and the fourth film post-existential (post-modern)...
...so (in chronological order) "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one", "The needs of the one outweighed the needs of the many", and "Humpback Whales".
Like I kind of just made all that up - but, it seems kinda right? xP
But because A Christmas Carol and Star Trek have a shared universe. This does mean that when Tiny Tim (being someone crippled with vulcan like logical abilities with beyond human abilities to read people's minds) wasn't being (existentially) authentic at the end of A Christman Carol when he says "God bless us, every one!" - he was just fulfilling everyone's expectations, including the readers of the story. Tiny Tim was breaking the fourth wall and satirizing Christmas.
Yeh. So. Captain Kirk was Scrooge all this time then.
A parasocial merry christmas to everyone! XD
What do you think of Moishe Postone’s response to the postmodern critique of Marxism? I find his thesis that Marx doesn’t posit transhistorical categories, and that the categories he deploys in Capital are historically specific yet universalize themselves as capitalism globalizes to be both convincing and empirically accurate. A lot of the postmodern/postcolonial criticisms which I’ve seen miss this point when they emphasize particularly over a “metanarrative” such as Marxism, because like, I’m not sure how you can understand something like the 2008 crisis that well without looking at Marx’s critique of capitalism. I think Postone does a good job of making this really clear.
do a video of mainlander philosophy
(I will do this until you make a video)
don't do a video of mainlander philosophy
(I will unsubscribe if you make a video)
I hear you I hear you. I'd like to do it someday but just don't know what approach to take, it'd be hard to apply him to some pop cultural phenomenon like with my other videos. I've considered making a video series introducing German philosophical pessimism in general but I don't know if that's the right kind of content for my channel
would be interested as well
Thanks for your efforts to disentangle these terms. Btw, while appreciating the dialogue I seriously dislike the way several images (eg of people), and sometimes images of text, are flashed on screen for only one second or less. Giving you time to linger on them would be less distracting and less irritating.
Great video. One note: Julia Kristeva's framework is psychoanalytic theory, not postmodernism.
hell ye boi
Great video comrade. Keep up the good work.
i agree to a great extend, but habermas is not really representational of the broader ideas of the Frankfurt School's critical theory. Adorno does actually share a lot of ideas with postmodern philosophers (that's also why someone like zizek can productively work with and combine theories by, among others, Adorno and Lacan). Adorno rejects the simple teleological ideas of 20th century Marxism (arguably not synonymous with Marx's theory) and identified the failure of this meta-narrative in the atrocities of Ausschwitz. It is true that the Frankfurt School still relies on the methodology of Marx (also of Freud) but they no longer believe in or were at least critical of the notion of a straight-forward socialist revolution (being severe critic of soviet state socialism).
Good video but I would disagree with the assertion that Donna Haraway is a postmodernist.
How would you describe the relationship between post-Marxism and postmodernism? From my understanding, it’s Marxism with a post-structuralist bend, and, given Post-structuralism’s association with postmodernism, how would you characterize this overall relationship?
Note for myself: Saul Newman, post-modernism influenced by Max Stirner.
Note for everyone else, especially if you like Nietzsche and 19th century philosophy: check out the Unique and Its Property by Max Stirner.
Wonderful, thanks.
What’s the outro music?
Frankfurt school was quintessential modernism. Like Bahaus.
This is really good work. Thanks!
Both excellent and essential.
I've opened The Postmodern
Condition:
A Report on Knowledge
by Jean-Francois Lyotard
tried to search for oppressor, oppressed no matches, I've tried "outdated" few matches but nothing about the division between the oppressor and the oppressed being outdated.
Can you narrow down, where in the book he claims that?
(I would really like to have the time to read the whole book, but alas)
On topic of "right wing postmodernists": Russian Thinker Alexander Dugin. Although that guy shatters the difference between Right and Left.
To explain it in the easiest way possible: From the right wing thought, he takes that basically, pre modern traditional thinking was right. Modernity imposed a "false language" which replaced the right language of tradition with "Scientism". (Basically the view that you can use science to reshape and control the whole world into your idea.) This scientismand technocracy produced totalitarianism and every ideology of modernity, no matter if its communists, fascist or capitalist, is inherently totalitarian because it wants to put a rigid order on the world and wants to destroy everything not fitting within this imposed order. Postmodernity is basically one way to end modernity. The problem with postmodernity is that it also destroys the "logos". (Logos is basically what Plato describes with the realm of ideas and Kabbalists call Aziluth.) Basically destroying the realm of ideas and revealing the absolute chaos underneath.
But at the same time, he says in his last chapter, that every group who tried to restore the logos failed and helped the "evil modernity". Thus, trying to rebuild the logos/structure does not work. Instead, the right thing to do is to embrace postmodernity and chaos, because chaos is every possibility. Thus, wanting chaos also implies that in that chaos, a certain limited order can appear. (As well as other kinds of different orders.)
Especially what you said about "postmodernity as a toolbox" fits as a description of that guy. He often does not say "This concrete solution I think is the best way to do a thing". Instead, he often basically says for example "look up this concept from Deleuze. This needs to apply in the new society. How you use it is completely up to you". In a strange way, his books aren't really a political ideology (although he calls them that way), but instead a manual about how you can create your own ideology within his framework.
Instead of explaining in detail what post modernism exactly is, the lecture explains what it is not and how it differs from others
Great work AS ALWAYS!
Question: Is Deconstruction usefull to any type of book? Like does that approach helps towards scientific documents? or do other methods exists? Views on Hermeneutics?
In fact, does deconstruction/hermenutics help to solve word problems in High School Science/Math?
*ITS GON B GUD*
Colour perception: I know it's not really to do with this video (though I think a contemporary perspective get's you closer to understanding it maybe). I could ramble on about the biology of the brain involved in colour perception - really I could. Or quote some jargon used by computer scientists that I don't really understand. Or perhaps give a physical account of it likely being that processes in the brain we use to construct what we see for ourselves represent a higher level of entropy than the visual information coming into the eye (perhaps the same can be said for the sound coming into our ears as well) - and this probably can be looked at using Guilio Tinoni or David Tse's work (which is a bit beyond me - but is more than about just computational ability as we would think of it being done by a home or lab computer).
In one sentance. Is it just best to say that. Visual perception is an Emergent Phenomena? (thinking along the lines of how Phycisist Sean Carroll might use the term in respect to this problem)... Which I guess would be another way of saying "Existence preceeds essense" - though I don't agree with much of existential philosophy that I am aware of (particularly Satre's homophobic "No exit").
Anyway. Cheers :)
Great video, love the nuance, I wonder if Jordan Peterson is aware of how Marxism and post modernism differ so widely
Your first mistake is assuming that Peterson knows anything
Steven hicks and post-feminazi revival band. (In the credits!) Thank you for the hard belly laugh!
2:47
Camus rejected the label of existentialist vehemently... It seems Sartre agreed with him.
I’ve been interested in Peterson’s idea of “postmodern neo Marxism”, so I’ve been picking the brain of my father, a fervent Trump supporter who is smart enough to memorize talking points without questioning them. Here’s what I got:
This term is fine for JP to use, even if it is contradictory, because both postmodernists and Marxists are generally not on the right, not conservative, and not Christian. Therefore they can be lumped together simply as “the enemy” or “the opposition”. Any difference between their ideas is a moot point if they need to be destroyed. I don’t know if you’d get such an honest answer from JP or the other UA-cam skeptics, but I think that is an underpinning in the thinking of many of them.
do you really see the need for an ideologe or an ideology to differentiate between groups and their goals if the result of these groups succeeding in their effords would always be opposed to the goals of the ideologe or ideology itself?
Interesting video, however, I have a few objections. Regarding the Frankfurt School Foucault expressively said that he was heavily influenced by books such as the Dialectic of Enlightenment. Indeed Horkheimer and Adorno also criticized bureaucracy, capitalism, technology, mass culture and the monopolization of knowledge. The connection is obvious.
Furthermore postmodernism isn't explicitly left-wing as it is just a collection of writings and thoughts that emerged in the mid to late 20th century. Wasn't Jameson critical of the postmodern era exactly due to the fact that he saw it as a reactionary, conservative and capitalist force? Postmodernism is very much in favour of market places were everything and anything can compete (the marketplace of ideas we hear so much about today). The critique of Enlightenment and modernism stemmed from the observation that these two movements had crushed all other modes of thought and created a monolith under which human beings were being crushed. As you point out criticizing constructions that social democrats and democratic left-wingers generally support such as the welfare state is very much part of postmodernism. The welfare state is a bureaucratic normalizing powerhouse that upholds discipline and order.
I think many people confuse the writings of Foucault or Derrida with the current postmodern ideology. Today's grand narrative is that there are no grand narratives and everything is relative and nihilistic except it isn't - we believe more than ever before. We are just stuck in an ideology (or episteme) of irony, meta-commentary, hyper self awareness etc - we know that we are dealing with are ideologies, myths and constructions but we go along with it anyway. Everything is done "ironically" which is the epitome of ideology. I think Zizek has written interestingly about this. For those interested in postmodernist philosophy should now turn their focus to this current state of affairs and the present institutions of normalization. I think the crisis of the European Union is very much an example of an monopolizing structure of the modernist age failing in a world of difference. Postmodernism was and is just a way of identifying the way in which history, culture, knowledge and society is being structured, organized, rationalized, presented, criticized. It can be adopted to anything anywhere in any time.
This channel is fantastic
What you don't talk about and I wonder why are all the popular combinations of postmarxist and postmodern theories. When I studied political philosophy in a pretty leftist faculty (Frankfurt) there were many seminars on combining Gramsci, young Marx and even critical theory with postmodern theories. A few names that I remember: Laclau & Mouffe, Alex Demirovic, Stuart Hall. A substantial part of critical international relations theory to name a popular field.
You're completely right that materialist, structural and deterministic marxism is not compatible with postmodern theories. These parts of marxist theories just get thrown out. The focus is on I think three main parts: culture, ideology and hegemony.
JP isn't very well versed in postmarxist theory but I do agree with him that it is this general philosophical trajectory that lies underneath the social justice activism in universities today. There was a self reflection of leftist thinkers after the RAF grew out of their seminars in the late 60s. The same should happen today with the SJW movement imo.
I think the persons critique was more so about the consequence of the postmodern ripple on the present social constructionist (i hate those two words) frame of mind. Ideas evolve unpredictably as they spread, sometimes due to mistranslation or misinterpretation, but most commonly by interacting with existing ideas and biases in an individuals worldview (this is why a nietzsche can cause a holocaust). I think that its nonsense to argue that, for example, judith butler and the identity politics/gender constructionist movements weren't greatly influenced by postmodern philosophy and it's impact on culture.
love the videos btw, just giving my 2 cents
We live in postmodern SOCIETY!!!!
Isaac Peachey WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY
"personally I don't care much for Habermas"
Unsubscribed (jk)
Honestly, I think Habermas gets a bad reputation unfairly in a lot of leftist circles.
Tbf, some of his takes on post-modernism are spectacularly bad. That's not to say he hasn't other good things to say, but he literally "named and shamed" Derrida and Foucault as crypto-conservatives. 😐 he says they are anti-enlightenment, but if you read Foucault's commentary on Kants "What is enlightenment?" Foucault expressly rejects the idea of talking in terms of pro-/anti-Enlightenment... Habermas also criticises people he considers to be ambivalent towards the enlightenment, but decides not to classify Foucault and Derrida there. Which is odd at best, in my opinion
Not saying Habermas is perfect and I definitely think he could have learned a few things from Foucault and Derrida.
@@R0DisG0D ah ye, that´s fair enough. I´m not actually hugely familiar with him, but we studied "Modernity as an unfinished project", and it really boiled my piss tbh. of course its also possible that that particular text isn´t neccesarily Habermas' last word on those guys...
EDIT: and also probably contributed to a certain disregard for Foucault, Derrida et al in certain circles
It's quite a large piece of work, but if you want to read something worthwhile by him, "Theory Of Communicative Action" is well-worth the read imho (though I am by no means a philosophy expert, just someone reading in their spare time). He explains a lot of sociological groundwork from Weber to Horkheimer/Adorno to Mead to Durkheim to Parsons and offers a theory wich attempts to combine the perspective of the individual and a systemic perspective.
His take on rationality is a little simplistic (though not completely naive) and that's where a PoMo perspective could be useful, but the project is nonetheless quite interesting. That's at least my thoughts on Habermas, again not as an expert.
You missed the influence of Heidegger and Arendt on the formulation of postmodern thought. While all of them thanked Heidegger, almost none of them ever referred to Arendt's contribution, which gets revived only with Agamben.
Srijan Butola
Can either really be considered postmodern in their thinking?
If anything their philosophy points in the opposite direction to the fragmentation and relativism of postmodernism.
what's the influence of heidegger in postmodern theories?
nyroysa the use of long hyphenated words
His interpretation of Nietzsche influenced many scholars, for example Vattimo and Foucault
Heidegger was pretty much the central driving force behind Derrida and deconstruction.
@@octavioamaroflores8634 Actually think the rediscovery of Nietzsche in France in particular was rescuing him from a Heideggerian interpretation. i.e. not viewing Nietzsche through a Heideggerian filter. Also, of course, not viewing him through a Nazi filter
@@eoinfagan1620 "There is more truth in Parsifal's formal structure which allows for different historical contextualizations than in its original context. It was Nietzsche, the great critic of Wagner, who was nonetheless the first to perform such a de-contextualization, proposing a new figure of Wagner: no longer Wagner as the poet of Teutonic mythology, of bombastic heroic grandeur, but the "miniaturist" Wagner, the Wagner of hystericized femininity, of delicate passages, of bourgeois family decadence. Along the same lines, Nietzsche was repeatedly reinvented throughout the XXth century, from the conservative-heroic proto-Fascist Nietzsche up to the "French" Nietzsche and the Cultural Studies Nietzsche. Convincing historical analysis can easily show how Nietzsche's theory was embedded in his particular political experience (the "revolt of the slaves" was for him exemplified by the Paris Commune); however, this in no way contradicts the fact that there is more truth in the "decontextualized" French Nietzsche of Deleuze and Foucault than in this "historically accurate" Nietzsche. And the argument is here not simply pragmatic: the point to be made is not that Deleuze's reading of Nietzsche, although "historically inaccurate," is "more productive"; it is rather that the tension between the basic universal frame of Nietzsche's thought and its particular historical contextualization is inscribed into the very edifice of Nietzsche's thought, is part of its very identity, in the same way that the tension between the universal form of human rights and their "true meaning" at the historical moment of their inception is part of their identity."
-Zizek
Hey, do PostM think that one (Self), as an existentialist might, can overcome structures without society/culture dismantling at the same time or prior to?
please make a video about Critical Theory..
I've got a better metanarrative, which is that PoMo eats itself. You do not have to understand injustice to see it and fight it. You do not have to know how and why your fight will be successful or fail, to fight injustice. Such philosophical understanding is important to some, and can help those who sit in armchairs mobilize the workers. I would not begrudge them their mouth flapping and academic screeding efforts. Sometimes a pebble's ripple in a pond can instigate a tsunami. Sometimes.
"Let deeds, not words, be your adorning." (from _The Hidden Words)_ And again,
"Guidance hath ever been given by words, and now it is given by deeds. Everyone must show forth deeds that are pure and holy, for words are the property of all alike, whereas such deeds as these belong only to Our loved ones. Strive then with heart and soul to distinguish yourselves by your deeds."
Sad to see no mention of George Novack.. :(
Thanks for the video.
boy oh boy do I have a lot to read now
I am not sure why you would equate eugénisme with the right since eugenism was espoused and promoted also by major thinkers on the left and socialists.
Another episode about not-postmoderism. Don't be frightened, define it. They'll still patreon-love you. $.
he has, and why would he be frightened to define it?
@@el_equidistante Only in reference to others. All these vids and no def, makes me think he/she is avoiding it - I'm guessing at the fear part. Would love to hear CP's take, no other names (including patreon), just CP. So bright.
What was is the track of for the closing track?
Technically, the Situationists forwarded their own Marxist form of theorizing capitalism in or as a postmodern condition, they just had their own philosophical terms and concepts for elucidating it.
Have you read some of the books or articles by ken wilber?
Where can I find an expansion on the argument of 15:26?
Cook philosophy
You differentiate between gender studies and postmodernity. Could you please elaborate on that in a later video?
I always thought that the postmodern philosopher Judith Butler has basically created the whole construct of gender studies and the 2 are almost identical. If there are major differences between the 2, I would like to know them.
Anyone in comments know where I can reliably get pdfs for the texts cited?
Jordan Peterson's entire public image would get ruined if he embraced the facts in this video.
I believe Mark Fisher was considered more of a Deleuzian than a Marxist in his theory. Definitely a socialist though. Also, Lefebvre has been considered a poststructuralist as well as a Marxist. Bataille and Blanchot too.
Satre isn't really considered a Neo-Marxist? I don't know? - I was literally born yesterday when it comes to philosophy. And I thought it was a natural conclusion that Satre was a Neo-Marxist - maybe not officially. I have once stated before: -
"(I am still learning about this second or third hand) I think the irony of many post-humanists or trans-humanists today is that, in terms of psychology, they have either gone backwards from humanistic psychology to the preceeding psycho-analysis of freud and jung in the case of existentialist feminist TERFs and so on of the neo-marxist left, or, back to the preceeding behavioural psychology (i.e "conversion therapy" of LGBTQI people) of B.F. Skinner etc with the Ayn Rand Objectivist Neo-Liberal and cybernetics approaches*. With Atheists of the Manosphere still being in the flawed humanistic psychology camp. Or just your basic neo-feudalist conservative essentialist religious fundamentalist."
*which I didn't realise at the time pretty much describes Jordan Peterson
Spaghettisburg... just yes. Just yes.
Isn't Post-modernism a _type_ of _intellectual_ anarchism? I mean, you could summarize Post-modernism as "context is everything" (from which you can derive a result like "metanarratives are suspect" very easily), and because we're all individuals, we all have a different context (life experience), which is already in essence a type of rejection of all authority being objective as it doesn't automatically reside in every potential context.
I wouldn't say that. There's already the fact that certain postmodernists are right-wing (as mentioned here) whereas anarchism is a far-left ideology. There's also the fact that Foucault for example viewed power (understood as an ability to influence people around you) as the defining factor to make a certain utterance within a discourse valid, meaning that a lot of discourses and utterances get excluded. Derrida directly said that there's a sort of center for what makes an interpretation valid, and that this is necessary for functioning in a society.
I also wouldn't say that "context is everything" sums it up, because several postmodernists would agree that within one context alone there are several networks, theories, and authorities that get measured up against each other within the same discourse, and that certain structures and paradigms give power to an authority that excludes other authorities. Deleuze directly claimed that the concept of an "individual" is dead and that we're now "dividuals", meaning that we're put into certain categories and discursive practices to even contextualize ourselves
How is this to be interpreted within the analytic / continental split?