Perspectives Part 3

 The Derrida Virus

This seminar focused on Jacques Derrida, a philosopher heavily involved in deconstructivism within postmodernism.  The Derrida Virus refers to different ideologies, and how they can't be seen but can also affect the way we behave, similarly to a virus. 

Seminar Notes

·        Jean Baudrillard focuses on ideas of the virtual and screens

·        Derrida – involved with deconstructivism, which was a massive part of the postmodern movement. He took apart language, the meanings behind words in order to reconstruct our reality. He was big in metaphysics and linguistics. He’s also a cultural theorist. He wanted to take apart the system. Essentially, he is a philosopher. One of the most critical thinkers of our generation. Denounced and accused of decadent.

·        Formalism was an important part of modernism.

·        Postmodernism shook up modernism. Two world wars and new unjust regimes formed postmodernism. Postmodern is uncertain and ambiguous. It undermines security.

·        Postmodernism is an attack on everything that came before. Also, everything is relative.

·        A virus – something that can’t be seen can also affect the way we behave.

·        Relativism is the prevailing thought system of postmodernism.

·        Modernity – examination

·        Postmodernity – reflection

·        Language is relative because everyone interprets it differently, it also changes between different cultures. Language is an unreliable cultural construct.

·        Where does reality exist?

·        Because of the cold war and liberalism, communism is seen as something as negative in the west. In china, the word communism doesn’t even exist. This is an example of relativism.

·        If something isn’t possible or isn’t a truth, then it can’t be trusted as such. Everything is a representation.

·        Deconstructivism - take apart ideas around ideologies.

·        Binary oppositions – ourselves and the other; male/female, mind/body, straight/gay. Our culture s beginning to think on a spectrum, rather than binary oppositions.

·        Derrida believes one of the oppositional terms is always privileged, controlling and dominating the other. One is considered preferable to the other.

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·        Gender is a performance – it is fictional. Gender isn’t real; it isn’t fixed, definitive or final.

·        Postmodernism – ‘political correctness gone mad’.

·        Postmodernism within films: Scream (horror movies and ideologies, roles.), Mulholland (deconstructing a reality throughout the film).