Postmodernism as an Experience:

Postmodernism as an Experience:
The Shock of the Present and the Shock of Abundance
Gadi Taub
(A Dispirited Rebellion: Essays on Contemporary Israeli Culture)


The postmodern experience is like a shock. It is a double shock: on one hand, a shock of abundance that is far beyond the point of saturation (abundance of information, consuming products, possibilities), and on the other hand, the shock of the present- a present that is seemingly detached from the course of time. This present does not evolve out of the past and does not indicate any directions in the future. In both types of shock, the sensation is paralyzing. It does not enable a perspective or distance that will allow the person to process and organize his thoughts and to word his emotions. We are capable of being amazed and astonished but new difficulties have been created on the way to comprehension and emotion.

The shock of the present is expressed through the feeling that the past has become blocked. The young generation feels that the information, culture and experience of the past generations are not capable of explaining its own currant situation. This is not a new feeling- the Zionist revolution also separated itself from the parents' generation and wanted to be constructed as a separate entity. In fact, almost every crisis or revolution is accompanied by this type of separation- a feeling that yesterday's explanations no longer provide a relevant ideological and theoretical platform to the new situation. The big difference is that in this type of revolutions, new and energetic powers bring down the existing social order and replace it with a new one. But this is not the case now. Now, it is as if the beliefs and explanations have crumbled independently, out of fatigue, with nothing that tried to replace them.
The fact that this happened independently, and not because a new and refreshing alternative rebelled against it, is related to the other end of this shock of the present: the narrow horizon of the future. This currant crisis has no plans or offers for the future and no real political stands. Just as the past has become blocked and unclear, the future has become vague and threatening. Blocking the connection to the past reflects the loss of faith in the future. The past and the future together are necessary for the feeling of continuation that gives people a sense of security, and they depend on each other.
This blocking of the past and loss of faith in the future have captured us in a constant state of present. They have destroyed the continuity of time. This lack of continuity creates the shock. The present does not evolve in a reasonable and gradual way from the past, and does not seem to continue in directions detectable in the future. The present is simply there, and there is no perspective of past and future to observe from. It is too close, too quick, too surprising. We cannot turn to tradition (past) or an ideology (future), that will let us step away from it and breathe. The present is a shock to us because when it is not a part of a continuity nothing prepares us for it. It is forever new.

The other side of the shock is the shock of abundance. Abundance becomes a shock because consciousness cannot find order or meaning in the huge flood of intensities and images, of color and symbols. In the invasion of everything into everything else. Consciousness is bombarded with a flow of images, messages and information that are far beyond our absorption capacity. The inconceivable contrasts between the images of starving children and fashion shows, chemical warfare next to cereal commercials, fitness classes and news in Turkish, video games, a rebellion in Chechnya, talk shows, economic shows, movie stars, AIDS patients, ethnic music festivals, all of these cease to exist separately, and become meaningless in face of the joint effect that is so paralyzing. The primary sensation is of disability to find meaning or sense in all of it. The ability to see each thing proportionally, to place it in an organized pattern, decreases. But not only the ability to comprehend is damaged. The ability to feel is also completely destroyed in this flood. The horrors do not horrify as much, just as the explanations do not explain as much. For example, if you try to make sense of MTV video clips, to interpret them in the same way we are used to interpreting other works of art, you will reach a dead end. The effect this medium creates usually is not based on understanding the single image and connecting it to the next one, but on the overload that intends to run the consciousness on the sealed surface. This medium gives up the comprehension and understanding of the stimulation, and replaces those with an aesthetic or emotional experience created by the flow of imagery. It creates a strong effect of a dynamic surface that does not enable a dimension of depth. The medium of video clips emphasizes the disconnection, the brightness of the external surface, like a screen between the viewer and a deep dimension of meaning or emotion that exists, or is supposed to exist, behind it.