The two terms that really jumped out at me from the Lyotard reading were realism and avant-garde. These terms apply to today’s world in many different ways but are becoming part of the spotlight in media and technology.
As for realism Lyotard feels that the notion of knowing something is not real, but assuming it is real is dangerous. I would agree with him here. From television shows to so called reality shows many people treat these two the same, if they both are even real. Many people have begun to devote time out of their lives to sit down and watch shows like Lost, Survivor, and The Hills. These shows become part of people’s routines and mess with their sense of reality, is there nothing more productive that could be occurring during the hours people spend watching, discussing, blogging and trying to understand these shows? The times when people used to read multiple newspapers every morning and listen to the radio to figure out what is really going on in the world people have turned to shows like The Office or even to Family Guy get a sense of what the work world or family living is like today which gives a false face to this. As we learned in the first day of class about reality “It ain’t what it used to be.”
Avant-garde has also become an everyday part of today’s society. This notion of I’m going to be in front of everybody else is a common theme I notice a lot. I see this as a way of companies taking products and trying to make them their own. When Under Armour came out and sold its clothing products companies such as Nike started to make vary similar products to cut into the market that Under Armour started. You tube is another way that anybody can try to take an original thing and try and make it theirs. But that takes us back to the question of what exactly is original. It seems somebody is always going to try and turn it into a commodity.
3 comments:
I really enjoyed reading this post because it spells out Lyotard's principles perfectly. As for your explanation of realism, you got it right on. I especially liked how you incorporated the quote, "reality ain't what it used to be" because this is exactly what Lyotard is saying. How are we supposed to differentiate between what is real and what isn't these days? There is so much trickery in media, especially television, these days that we cannot rely on media being completely truthful. This idea applies to not only reality TV shows, but also the news. Every news station has a bias on what they choose to cover and what they prefer to keep a "secret", in a sense. There is a bias in everything because every person has their own biases and media is a man-made phenomenon.
Your description of avant-garde is simply put. Everybody, especially in Western culture, is out to get ahead of the other person, whether that is financial success, more athletic, or more intelligent. I have grown up with this competitiveness as I am sure everyone else has. Men especially portray this image of avant-garde. Throughout my education, my friends have always competed with grades. I suppose this was a good competition because it strived us to get good grades so we would study a lot not to learn the material, but to get the better grade than the other person.
I really enjoyed your post Juice15! Nicely put
-Merrychristmas!, 2.8.09
Juice 15-
Solid post. You say some intriguing things about the dangers of reality.
-Starfish
Good post. I am glad you commented on Juice15's post and that their writing inspired you to do some thinking of your own. I found it interesting when you discussed the trickery of the media.
-Starfish
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