ABSTRACT

The demise of deconstruction, as no longer a viable theoretical paradigm for interpretation and understanding, appears also to have marked the end of a critical phase to which, and for many reasons, we give the name of ‘modernity’. The coming on the scene of post-modernism, or postmodernity, has raised since its inception many questions as to its theoretical acceptability. One could mention the Marxist critique of Alex Callinicos, Against Postmodernism. A Marxist Critique (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989), which rejects outright all postmodernist claims as well as that of a postmodern age in no uncertain terms: ‘the various claims for the existence or emergence of a postmodern era are false’ (p.5). Or even Christopher Norris’s critique in What’s Wrong with Postmodernism. Critical Theory and the Ends of Philosophy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990), which is the latest and most critical response challenging the theoretical legitimacy of postmodernism, where Norris questions the all too easy closures of thinkers like Baudrillard and Lyotard amongst others, whose ‘postmodernist’ thinking is resolved in ‘collapsing every last form of ontological distinction or critical truth-claim’ (p. 23).