Within the Sounds of Postmodernism

So I'm walking across campus today....and what do I think of. Postmodernism. Weird. Right? Yeah. Well what got me thinking about it was Simon and Garfunkels' Sound of Silence. For you, oh gentle reader, not familiar with this, here is a good overview of it from Wikipedia.

Hello darkness, my old friend,
Ive come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.

At the crux of postmodernism is the idea that the stresses of modernism have caused us to find ways to cope with everyday life. And we are inundated with choices. Maybe this is why more people are on medications for anxiety and depression. Now, while Postmodernism is said to have arisen as a reaction to World War II, I feel that it is actually a reaction to globalization. We seek individual identity and worth in the face of homogenizing forces beyond our control, yet we seek to connect with those around us, despite skepticism about others. We are in essence, confused. Our only solace, is the recess of our minds, where even then, we don't always find silence...

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone,
neath the halo of a street lamp,
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of
A neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence.

We are conflicted with ourselves. We have so many choices and opportunities. Yet, they seem to distract from the larger picture of things. Postmodernists, that come from a Marxist perspective, would argue that capitalism has created a consumer culture, in which we think only of ourselves and of inane things, such as the latest shoes on sale.

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking,
People hearing without listening,
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence.

Silence allows for reflection, but it also is the lack of communication and dialogue between individuals and society. Not only are we a dying society, in the sense that even "noble" non-profit organizations are now professionalized and lose track of those they are to serve, but even in the sense that we don't even speak to our neighbors, across the world, and even just living on the other side of the wall from us. And those that try to reach out to our neighbors, meet only frustration.....

Fools said i,you do not know
Silence like a cancer grows.
Hear my words that I might teach you,
Take my arms that I might reach you.
But my words like silent raindrops fell,
And echoed
In the wells of silence

The failure to connect- we are becoming the generation of computers and the internet. Human contact is replaced with the tip-tap of keys and the harsh glare (or soft glare if you have the latest technology) of a computer screen. I highly suggest reading Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone- it is very insightful about the dropoff of associational life in the United States and in the West. Our engagement in society has dropped off. Society and communities die from an apathy, born of the conditions of modernism. We create false idols- consumerism, money, wealth, greed, and power. And those that note these aflictions in society are cast off as societal lepers- label them communists, liberals, hippies. Anything, to devalue their observations and maintain the "norms" of society.

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon God they made.
And the sign flashed out its warning,
In the words that it was forming.
And the signs said, the words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls.
And whispered in the sounds of silence.