Nemo, Lyotard -Late

Lyotard discusses the idea of totalizing metanarratives. A metanarrative is a commonly shared set of believes or stories that people use to make sense of their world or their lives. A totalized metanarrative has total control of how society views the world. Lyotard believes that it is important to get rid of these metanarratives because they are bad for society. He says that metanarratives prevent us from being critical thinkers. A way of challenging the metanarratives is through forms of artistic expression, (writing, painting, drawing, fashion design, ect.) that push the boundaries of what is accepted as the social norm or the status quo – the avant-garde. Avant-garde is anything (usually forms of art work) that is new, unconventional, or experimental. Lyotard says, “eclecticism is the degree zero of contemporary general culture” (42). People are always looking for ways to be different, to find their own identity. The only problem, now a-days, is that it is extremely hard to create something ‘new’ or ‘original’ and once that has been achieved, Lyotard says that the people who have questioned the rules “are destined to have little credibility”; “they have no guarantee of an audience” (41). In this excerpt he is discussing how someone who goes against the norms of society is taking a risk because people may or may not agree and want to follow them. I think that this is no longer true because in our society everyone is always trying to push the envelope and be different. The problem however is that once someone creates something ‘new’ and ‘different’ it will be marketed and consumed by society making, whatever it was in the first place unoriginal. This is why Lyotard argues that nothing can be new anymore. These are just my personal opinions so feel free to disagree with them.