What is Post-modernism? And why is it so threatening to Marxism? Or is it?

Post-modernism is an umbrella term for a set of ideas, beliefs, attitudes, that began to crystallize as a movement, even a “theory,” in the '60s. Critical of the underlying absolutist and totalizing metaphysical assumptions of the philosophic tradition concerning the nature of knowledge, reality, and values, it has been seen as a threat to the foundational assumptions of Marxism as well. By examining the views of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Derrida — thinkers who are identified as postmodernists and interpreted variously as apolitical, reactionary, nihilistic, or all three — we can better judge whether their views undermine liberatory political goals or, rather, have affinities with Marxism’s own critique of the philosophic tradition. We might even decide that postmodern critiques provide Marxism with a more radical, more critical, edge than it would have by resisting them.

Presented by Sandra Luft, Humanities professor at SF State.