The Routledge Companion to Critical and Cultural Theory, 2nd Edition

11POSTMODERNISM

LINDA HUTCHEON

 

 

 

 

DEFINING THE POSTMODERN

In the final decades of the twentieth century and even into the new millennium, the term ‘postmodern’ has appeared to be more casually bandied about than carefully defined. For some it was a mere ‘moment’, while for others it was a more general ‘condition’. Some denigrated it to just a ‘style’; still others elevated it to a historical ‘period’. These variations do not only signal differences in critics' perspectives, however; they also mark the multiplicity and complexity of the cultural phenomena gathered together under this heading. There is certainly no shortage of differing opinions and competing models of postmodernism, but the critics are not the only ones to blame for the sometimes ...