Essay: Limitations of viewing modernity and postmodernity as paradigmatic

The nexus between modernity and postmodernity is debated throughout the field of social science. Subsequently, the fault-lines of where the two conditions intersect are unclear. By using communication and media studies as a discipline, and autism as a subject area to contextualise these debates; this essay will explore the limitations of viewing modernity and postmodernity as paradigmatic and will propose that the conditions intertwine. This essay will evaluate two prominent fault-lines by exploring the competing discourses surrounding knowledge production and circulation to underpin how both conditions impact our knowledge making. While also addressing the construction of identity to assess whether our understanding of identity has progressed.
Understanding Modernity and Postmodernity
The similarity of the terms ‘modernity’ and ‘postmodernity’ reflect the theoretical and historical uncertainty in defining these terms. Subsequently, two polarised understandings of the link between modernity and postmodernity proliferate. Firstly, positioning postmodernity as a new condition comes from the contention that the modernist understandings of society are no longer applicable to the contemporary social situation. Therefore, principles of postmodernity critique modernity. Alternatively, postmodernity can be viewed as an extension of modernist ideologies through repositioning modernist concepts to apply to contemporary social issues (Habermas, 1962).
The main principles of modernity are characterised as scientific rationality and conformity. While postmodernity focusses on ontology and scepticism of meta-narratives. These will be discussed further in the following sections.
Knowledge: Scientific or Relative
A significant fault-line between modernity and postmodernity is knowledge creation and circulation. Paramount to Social Science Research (SSR) is the theory of knowledge, which is translated into modernity through rationalisation and into postmodernity through empiricism. The decline of objectivism and the rise of relativism is integral to SSR as these differing assumptions guide our understanding of society. By contrasting rationality with relativism, this section will argue that elements of both are needed to understand society.
Modernity was informed by the belief that scientific rationality is fundamental to understanding society. Modernity witnessed a transition from the traditional belief that the social world was informed by religion to scientific rationality. This period, known as the Enlightenment, encouraged a different way of conceiving the world by inspiring a sense of curiosity to uncover the meanings of society. Thus, this inquisitive thought-process built the foundations of SSR (Benton & Craib, 2011). However, the means of investigating human nature were limited to scientific method, forming a positivist way of appropriating society. This echoes the want for certainty that characterised modernity. Such positivism has implications for the field of SSR, as for researchers interpreting society from alternative perspectives and using non-scientific methods is crucial to help us understand the social world. Therefore, researching from a modernist perspective would limit the research lens.
To contextualise this with relation to the media in modernity, the media followed mass communication or a ‘one-to-many’ approach, meaning that knowledge claims were circulated on a wide-scale. While this is beneficial to circulate accurate information, it overlooks individualism. This reflects Foucault’s (1977) concept of power-knowledge, which suggests that those in power create and circulate knowledge to the many. Here, Foucault’s critique suggests that while knowledge circulation was thought to be transparent, it merely reflected the sociohistorical constructs of power. While this is a critique of modernity, this evaluation is relevant today due to the media’s manipulation of messages which suggests that power relations between media producers and receivers are still uneven. Contrastively, the development of technology in postmodernity has meant that simulations of authentic knowledge have been lost and distinguishing between truth and fakery is problematic; for instance, ‘fake news‘. This reflects Baudrillard’s (1994) theorisation of simulacra, which suggests that knowledge claims in postmodernity have no relation to reality.
The postmodern stance on knowledge reflects ontology as opposed to the modernist preference for epistemology. To which, Bauman (1987) summarises as “no rational system of thought can legislate what is the truth; the truth can only be interpreted” (in Howe, 1994, p.520). Here, postmodernity articulates that knowledge is separate from God and Marxist power plays; meaning that truth must be interpreted independently. Therefore, postmodernity follows a constructivist ideology by suggesting that the social world is created through human intervention not through scientific inquiry, as modernity argues. Reflexivity is integral to postmodernity; instead of accepting knowledge like in modernity, society should reflect and challenge it (Giddens, 1991). With this, postmodernity can be seen as a response to the blinkered modern condition. However, as the postmodern approach to knowledge focuses on the construction of truth claims by questioning actualities and destabilising the knower/known dualism that modernity offered; postmodernists are critiqued for accepting numerous meanings and being too sceptical of reality (Mumby, 1997). Therefore, the role of SSRers in postmodernity is to interpret the social world and communicate this accordingly.
Regarding the media, media constructivism suggests that reality and the representations of reality in the media have become conflated (Baudrillard, 1993). This is a prominent issue overlooked in postmodernity as the media is used to gain knowledge about society; especially with the omnipresence of digital media in contemporary society. Consequently, while recognising that individual interpretation is essential, this only heightens the importance of transparency in the communication of the message (Kilgore, 2001). With relation to disabilities, this is a profound issue as the contemporary representation of those with autism represents an ‘exceptional’ ideology, which creates assumptions that those who have autism should be part of a ‘gifted-and-talented’ elite (Jarrett, 2014; Knights, 2018; Anonymous, 2019). While this is true for a proportion of people with autism, this representation ignores a large number of people with autism who are what modernists would define as ‘non-functioning’. The relativist position that postmodernity follows provides greater insight into the impact of media representations on constructing realities, which reinforces that there is no absolute knowledge.
The classification of disability exemplifies the differing approaches to knowledge that modernity and postmodernity offer. The medical model of disability links diagnosis to an individual’s anatomy by recognising disability as a ‘problem’ for the individual and not society. Whereas, the social model identifies that society that ‘disables’ the person (Shakespeare & Watson, 2002). According to Corker and Shakespeare (2006), the medical model epitomises the modernist knowledge systems, meaning that truth claims based on scientific inquiry were considered more valuable than experience (Mease, 2017). While this approach is beneficial for classification, it fails to consider the lived experience by limiting the understanding of disability to a generalised anatomical sense. Conversely, the social model reflects postmodernity by acknowledging that disabilities are experienced differently, and society should make continuous efforts to accommodate the individual needs of the person. Shakespeare and Watson (2002) challenge this by positioning the social model as a modernist concept by arguing that it reduces disability to a totalising meta-narrative. In response, the ambiguity surrounding the discourse defining disability to the social and medical models reinforces the uncertainty of defining modernity and postmodernity into distinctive categories. Nevertheless, the medical and social models reflect the changes in the philosophy of SSR by exhibiting the development of modernist principles into postmodernity as leading to significant progression of thinking about the social world.
While modernity and postmodernity differ in their approach to knowledge claims and communications of truths, it is clear that postmodernity is a development of modern principles. Modernity appreciates scientific knowledge as absolute truth, while postmodernity recognises knowledge through interpretation. With relation to SSR and investigating disability, the postmodern stance would be more applicable due to its celebration of differentiation.
Framing Identity
The perceived binarism between cultural identity and self-integrity reflects a fault-line between modernity and postmodernity. Identity in modernity was established by social norms dictated by elitists, while postmodernity encourages a proliferation of identities which challenged social-norms. Understanding identity is integral to SSR as identity construction influences the way we conceive social groups and form prejudices. By contrasting identity formation in modernity and postmodernity, this section will explore the development of identity construction from a defined position to a liberated condition. This section will argue that principles of both are needed to prevent marginalisation.
While in traditional societies, social order was based on defined roles. Modernity encouraged people to self-identify roles. Giddens (1991) suggests that those living in modernity were governed by questions of “how to act? Who to be?” (p.70). These questions reflect the desire for certainty that is integral to modernity. While modernity encouraged the quest for one’s true self, external influences of consumerism and capitalism shaped society’s understanding of identity through fixed identities, namely meta-narratives, being ‘sold’ to society (Lyotard, 1979). This is prevalent in contemporary society on a more diverse scale resulting in greater choice in identity formation. Identity in modernity was limited to a ‘top-down’ Marxist approach in which the elite determined how people should identify and articulated what was socially acceptable. Solomos and Back (1996) suggest that societies create classifications within the context of political and social regulation, which forms social norms and expectations. Such classification built the foundations of prejudice by categorising people according to the ‘in-group’ and ‘out-group’ dichotomy, as proposed by Tajfel (1969). With relation to disability, Hughes (2012) suggests that the primary social response to disability in modernity was invalidation, exclusion or correction based on the assumption that disability is an “ontological deficit” (p.17). Therefore, perceptions of disability in modernity reflect the understanding of ability and disability as polarised concepts. This reflects what Bauman (1992) theorises as ‘gardening the state’. The ‘gardener’ (authoritative figures) provide the best’ plants’ (citizens) with the finest conditions to flourish and attempts to tame or eradicate unruly ‘plants’ (those who do not coincide with the social norms) (Bauman, 1992). With this, identity construction within modernity was limited to authoritative figures controlling norms of identity. This has detrimental impacts on the reception of minority groups who were disregarded for not conforming to regulated norms.
By contrast, Jackson and Hogg (2010) suggest that the decline of social hierarchy by questioning elitists/experts and having confidence in oneself are key principles of postmodernity. This means that the discourse surrounding identity that was created by ‘white-able-bodied-heterosexual-men’ that plagued modernity is destabilised and replaced by individual identities in postmodernity. This is pivotal to understanding disabilities as it undermines the governing rules that define normality by appreciating disability as a social construct (Tregaskis, 2002). From a SSR perspective, the inclusive approach that postmodernity offers reflects the celebration of difference and desire to research the real social world. However, with the proliferation of identities in contemporary society, identity construction has become problematic. With relation to autism, psychologists suggest that the autistic spectrum is becoming too all-encompassing that the difference between those with autism and the general public will become non-existent in less than 10-years (Rødgaard, Jensen, Vergnes, Soulières & Mottron, 2019). Supporting this, Clements (2019) suggests that “many people now self-identify as autistic as though it were a fashion label rather than a debilitating disorder”. This attitude has led to the marginalisation of autistic people, and social media enhances this with ‘#ActuallyAutistic’ encouraging people to self-identify. It is evident that while a proliferation of identities offers liberation by encouraging people to construct their own identities, but can have detrimental impacts on those who are disabled.
While the construction of identities in modernity and postmodernity differ, with modernity offering linear identities and postmodernity enabling individuals to choose their identity. The two overlap due to the need for linearity but also individualism.
Conclusion
The fault-lines of modernity and postmodernity have been explored through knowledge claims and identity formation. Modernity focusses on rationality and a top-down approach to knowledge and identity construction. While this may be beneficial for classification and to build the foundations of knowledge, modernity rejects individuation which can lead to marginalisation. In comparison, postmodernity follows the decline of absolute truth and meta-narratives resulting in knowledge and identity being subjective. While postmodernity does not exclude the need for classification that modernity afforded, the lens of critique that postmodernity offers extends the boundaries of disability studies by appreciating the lived experience as subjective. By adopting a postmodernist stance to research autism opens up a realm of critiquing opportunity to challenge some of the existing