Postmodernism: The Limits of Questioning

For the postmodern thinkers, the change from the Modern to the Postmodern occurs
somewhere between 1960 and 1970. This is certainly an obvious historical perspective to
present the postmodern condition. Thus, the postmodern is also a subject to change in the
ongoing flux of history. The leftist approach looks at the postmodern as a historical condition.
It is for them a phase of contemporary capitalism that possesses a long history in the past,
having its roots in the industrialization of the 18th century. It is a social, as well as, a cultural
form with historical origin and material background. Likewise it is subject to change as any
other phase of human history.

The post modern thinkers are preoccupied with certain factors like language, culture and
discourse. They are infamous for stating that it is through language only that we engage with
reality. Human beings and their social relations are constituted by language alone. The access
to reality of human beings is only through language. It is the extreme deconstructionist view
that society is not simply like language, but it is language. Thus, we are entrapped in our
language. The result is, according to them, no external standard of truth, or external referent
to knowledge is available to us beyond the specific discourses that we possess.

Raghuvanshmani