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Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourse characterized by skepticism toward the "grand narratives" of modernism; rejection of epistemic (scientific) certainty or the stability of meaning; and sensitivity to the role of ideology in maintaining political power. Claims to objectivity are dismissed as naïve realism, with attention drawn to the conditional nature of knowledge claims within particular historical, political, and cultural discourses. The postmodern outlook is characterized by self-referentiality, epistemological relativism, moral relativism, pluralism, irony, irreverence, and eclecticism; it rejects the "universal validity" of binary oppositions, stable identity, hierarchy, and categorization.
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- Antihumanism: a branch of theory that is critical of traditional humanism and traditional ideas about the human condition, vitality and agency.
- Cultural posthumanism: a branch of cultural theory critical of the foundational assumptions of humanism and its legacy that examines and questions the historical notions of "human" and "human nature", often challenging typical notions of human subjectivity and embodiment and strives to move beyond archaic concepts of "human nature" to develop ones which constantly adapt to contemporary technoscientific knowledge.
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- Posthuman condition: the deconstruction of the human condition by critical theorists.
- Posthuman transhumanism: a transhuman ideology and movement which, drawing from posthumanist philosophy, seeks to develop and make available technologies that enable immortality and greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities in order to achieve a "posthuman future".
- AI takeover: A variant of transhumanism in which humans will not be enhanced, but rather eventually replaced by artificial intelligences. Some philosophers and theorists, including Nick Land, promote the view that humans should embrace and accept their eventual demise as a consequence of a technological singularity. This is related to the view of "cosmism", which supports the building of strong artificial intelligence even if it may entail the end of humanity, as in their view it "would be a cosmic tragedy if humanity freezes evolution at the puny human level".
- The Merge Hypothesis : Futurologism, a variant of Transhumanism in which humans and AI will merge to create a new post human species, with AI absorbing elements of humanity such as creativity, empathy, and social cohesion, and humanity being enhanced by AI to achieve new feats.
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The sociology of knowledge is the study of the relationship between human thought, the social context within which it arises, and the effects that prevailing ideas have on societies. It is not a specialized area of sociology. Instead, it deals with broad fundamental questions about the extent and limits of social influences on individuals' lives and the social-cultural basis of our knowledge about the world. The sociology of knowledge has a subclass and a complement. Its subclass is Sociology of scientific knowledge. Its complement is the sociology of ignorance.
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Social theories are analytical frameworks, or paradigms, that are used to study and interpret social phenomena. A tool used by social scientists, social theories relate to historical debates over the validity and reliability of different methodologies, the primacy of either structure or agency, as well as the relationship between contingency and necessity. Social theory in an informal nature, or authorship based outside of academic social and political science, may be referred to as "social criticism" or "social commentary", or "cultural criticism" and may be associated both with formal cultural and literary scholarship, as well as other non-academic or journalistic forms of writing.
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In the fields of philosophy, the terms obscurantism and obscurationism identify and describe the anti-intellectual practices of deliberately presenting information in an abstruse and imprecise manner that limits further inquiry and understanding of a subject. The two historical and intellectual denotations of obscurantism are: (1) the deliberate restriction of knowledge — opposition to the dissemination of knowledge; and (2) deliberate obscurity — a recondite style of writing characterized by deliberate vagueness.
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Culture is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups. Culture is often originated from or attributed to a specific region or location.
Cultural studies, also called the cultural sciences, is an interdisciplinary field or scientific branch that examines the dynamics of contemporary culture and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices relate to wider systems of power associated with, or operating through, social phenomena. These include ideology, class structures, national formations, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, and generation. Employing cultural analysis, cultural studies views cultures not as fixed, bounded, stable, and discrete entities, but rather as constantly interacting and changing sets of practices and processes. The field of cultural studies encompasses a range of theoretical and methodological perspectives and practices. Although distinct from the discipline of cultural anthropology and the interdisciplinary field of ethnic studies, cultural studies draws upon and has contributed to each of these fields.
A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to attempt to reveal, critique, and challenge power structures. With roots in sociology and literary criticism, it argues that social problems stem more from social structures and cultural assumptions than from individuals. It argues that ideology is the principal obstacle to human liberation. Critical theory finds applications in various fields of study, including psychoanalysis, sociology, history, communication theory, philosophy and feminist theory.
Marxist cultural analysis is a form of cultural analysis and anti-capitalist cultural critique, which assumes the theory of cultural hegemony and from this specifically targets those aspects of culture which are profit driven and mass-produced under capitalism.
References
- ↑ [ dead link ] "Interview with Ian Angus". 25 August 2010.
- ↑ Timothy Casey, "I.A. Angus, "Technique and enlightenment: Limits of instrumental reason" (Book Review)," Husserl Studies, Vol. 3 (3) (January 1986):245-246.
- ↑ Norman Madarasz, "Delivering our Attention: Ian Angus’ Primal Scenes of Communication," Symposium: Journal of the Canadian Society for Hermeneutics and Postmodern Thought, Vol. V, no. 2 (Fall 2001): 256-7.
- ↑ [ dead link ]Glasberg, Ronald (2001). "Review of A Border Within: National Identity, Cultural Plurality and Wilderness". History of Intellectual Culture. 1 (1).
- ↑ Thomas Dunk, "National Culture, Political Economy and Socio-Cultural Anthropology in English Canada," Anthropologica, Vol.42, No. 2 (2000): 131–145.
- ↑ [ dead link ] Graeme Nicholson, "Review of Identity and Justice by Ian Angus," Modern Horizons June 20, (2012)
- ↑ "Athabasca University Press – The Undiscovered Country: Essays in Canadian Intellectual Culture". Aupress.ca. Retrieved 18 November 2013.
- ↑ Maria Guglietti. "The University and a New Definition of Enlightenment," Topia 28 (2012): 306.
- ↑ A selection from Chapter 6, "The Transformation of Knowledge," was printed in Truthout Magazine under the title, "Does the University Have a Future in Network Society?"
- ↑ Bob Hanke. "Ian Angus in Conversation with Bob Hanke," Canadian Journal of Media Studies Vol. 7 June (2010): 1–16.
- ↑ Maria Guglietti. "The University and a New Definition of Enlightenment," Topia 28 (2012): 307.
- ↑ Alan Bourke. "Review of Ian Angus. Love the Questions: University Education and Enlightenment," Canadian Journal of Sociology On-Line Vol. 35 No. 3 (2010): 2.
- ↑ "Love the Questions: University Education and Enlightenment | General". Times Higher Education. 8 April 2010. Retrieved 18 November 2013.
