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2 Metamodernism: Period, Structure of Feeling, and Cultural Logic – A Case Study of Contemporary Autofiction

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New Directions in Philosophy and Literature
Ein Kapitel aus dem Buch New Directions in Philosophy and Literature
2Metamodernism: Period, Structure of Feeling, and Cultural Logic – A Case Study of Contemporary AutofictionRobin van den Akker, Alison Gibbons, and Timotheus VermeulenIn this chapter, we further explore the overall argument advanced by Metamodern-ism: Historicity, Affect, and Depth after Postmodernism (van den Akker, Gibbons, and Vermeulen 2017) that metamodernism is a newly dominant cultural logic that can be conceptualised along the axes of historicity, affect, and depth, by applying its fi ndings to a reading of autofi ctional literature. As such, we fi rst revisit our notion of metamodernism along these axes. We then provide a brief overview of Fredric Jameson’s conceptualisation of the cultural logic of postmodernism. Finally, we dis-cuss Ben Lerner’s 10:04 (2014) and Adam Thirlwell’s Kapow! (2012) in order to demonstrate the way in which metamodernism manifests in literature and differs from previous postmodernist fi ctions.By Way of Introduction: The Emergence of MetamodernismSince 2009, we have sought to develop – in teams and individually – the notion of metamodernism as a period, structure of feeling, and cultural logic. In doing so, our thinking revived and revisioned the designation of metamodernism that had itself been around since the 1970s (Abramson 2015; van den Akker and Vermeulen 2017). Throughout, our critical operationalisation of the concept of metamodern-ism focused on charting an emergent cultural logic related to a dominant structure of feeling situated within the fourth reconfi guration of Western capitalist societ-ies (Vermeulen and van den Akker 2010). What this means is that we have sought to understand cultural practices as expressions of what Raymond Williams has described as ‘a particular quality of social experience’, one that is ‘historically distinct from other particular qualities, which gives the sense of a generation or of a period’ (Williams 1977: 131), a zeitgeist, if you will.Our understanding of metamodernism was conceived, originally, on the back of a double intuition (Vermeulen and van den Akker 2010). On the one hand, we per-ceived a gap between the many postmodern theories circulating in various studies across the arts and culture and the actual material conditions and dominant artistic and cultural phenomena of the 2000s. Our aim has always been to bring theory to bear more closely on contemporary culture by following its trajectory. On the other 6115_Rudrum.indd416115_Rudrum.indd 4106/08/195:03PM06/08/19 5:03 PM

2Metamodernism: Period, Structure of Feeling, and Cultural Logic – A Case Study of Contemporary AutofictionRobin van den Akker, Alison Gibbons, and Timotheus VermeulenIn this chapter, we further explore the overall argument advanced by Metamodern-ism: Historicity, Affect, and Depth after Postmodernism (van den Akker, Gibbons, and Vermeulen 2017) that metamodernism is a newly dominant cultural logic that can be conceptualised along the axes of historicity, affect, and depth, by applying its fi ndings to a reading of autofi ctional literature. As such, we fi rst revisit our notion of metamodernism along these axes. We then provide a brief overview of Fredric Jameson’s conceptualisation of the cultural logic of postmodernism. Finally, we dis-cuss Ben Lerner’s 10:04 (2014) and Adam Thirlwell’s Kapow! (2012) in order to demonstrate the way in which metamodernism manifests in literature and differs from previous postmodernist fi ctions.By Way of Introduction: The Emergence of MetamodernismSince 2009, we have sought to develop – in teams and individually – the notion of metamodernism as a period, structure of feeling, and cultural logic. In doing so, our thinking revived and revisioned the designation of metamodernism that had itself been around since the 1970s (Abramson 2015; van den Akker and Vermeulen 2017). Throughout, our critical operationalisation of the concept of metamodern-ism focused on charting an emergent cultural logic related to a dominant structure of feeling situated within the fourth reconfi guration of Western capitalist societ-ies (Vermeulen and van den Akker 2010). What this means is that we have sought to understand cultural practices as expressions of what Raymond Williams has described as ‘a particular quality of social experience’, one that is ‘historically distinct from other particular qualities, which gives the sense of a generation or of a period’ (Williams 1977: 131), a zeitgeist, if you will.Our understanding of metamodernism was conceived, originally, on the back of a double intuition (Vermeulen and van den Akker 2010). On the one hand, we per-ceived a gap between the many postmodern theories circulating in various studies across the arts and culture and the actual material conditions and dominant artistic and cultural phenomena of the 2000s. Our aim has always been to bring theory to bear more closely on contemporary culture by following its trajectory. On the other 6115_Rudrum.indd416115_Rudrum.indd 4106/08/195:03PM06/08/19 5:03 PM

Kapitel in diesem Buch

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents v
  3. Acknowledgements viii
  4. Editors ’ Preface ix
  5. General Introduction: Opposition of the Faculties, Philosophy’s Literary Impossibility 1
  6. PART I Beyond the Postmodern: Literature, Philosophy, and the Question of the Contemporary
  7. Editor’s Introduction 17
  8. 1 The Polymodern Condition: A Report on Cluelessness 22
  9. 2 Metamodernism: Period, Structure of Feeling, and Cultural Logic – A Case Study of Contemporary Autofiction 41
  10. 3 The Ends of Metafiction, or, The Romantic Time of Egan’s Goon Squad 55
  11. 4 Virtually Human: Posthumanism and (Post-)Postmodern Cyberspace in Gary Shteyngart ’s Super Sad True Love Story 74
  12. PART II Beyond the Subject: Posthuman and Nonhuman Literary Criticism
  13. Editor’s Introduction 97
  14. 5 Hélène Cixous’s So Close; or, Moving Matters on the Subject 102
  15. 6 Meillassoux, the Critique of Correlationism, and British Romanticism 122
  16. 7 Fictional Objects Fictional Subjects 138
  17. 8 On the Death of Meaning 152
  18. PART III Beyond the Object: Reading Literature through Actor-Network Theory, Object-Oriented Philosophy, and the New Materialisms
  19. Editor’s Introduction 173
  20. 9 Neither Billiard Ball nor Planet B: Latour’s Gaia, Literary Agency, and the Challenge of Writing Geohistory in the Anthropocene Moment 179
  21. 10 Three Problems of Formalism: An Object-Oriented View 198
  22. 11 A Field of Heteronyms and Homonyms: New Materialism, Speculative Fabulation, and Wor(l)ding 215
  23. 12 Emerson’s Speculative Pragmatism 234
  24. PART IV Ordinary Language Criticism: Reading Literature through Anglo-American Philosophy
  25. Editor’s Introduction 253
  26. 13 Two Examples of Ordinary Language Criticism: Reading Conant Reading Rorty Reading Orwell – Interpretation at the Intersection of Philosophy and Literature 258
  27. 14 Stanley Cavell and the Politics of Modernism 279
  28. 15 Inferentialist Semantics, Intimationist Aesthetics, and Walde 297
  29. PART V Embodiment as Ethics: Literature and Life in the Anthropocene
  30. Editor’s Introduction 315
  31. 16 Living to Tell the Story: Characterisation, Narrative Perspective, and Ethics in Climate Crisis Flood Novels 321
  32. 17 Contemporary Anthropocene Novels: Ian McEwan’s Solar, Jeanette Winterson’s The Stone Gods, Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood 338
  33. 18 The Day of the Dark Precursor : Philosophy, Fiction, and Fabulation at the End of the World – A Fictocritical Guide 361
  34. 19 So to Speak 382
  35. PART VI Politics after Discipline: Literature, Life, Control
  36. Editor’s Introduction 389
  37. 20 Literary Study’s Biopolitics 394
  38. 21 We Have Been Paranoid Too Long to Stop Now 410
  39. 22 Securing Neoliberalism: The Contingencies of Contemporary US Fiction 429
  40. 23 Automatic Art , Automated Trading: Finance, Fiction, and Philosophy 450
  41. Notes on Contributors 466
  42. Index 471
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https://doi.org/10.1515/9781474449168-006

Kapitel in diesem Buch

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents v
  3. Acknowledgements viii
  4. Editors ’ Preface ix
  5. General Introduction: Opposition of the Faculties, Philosophy’s Literary Impossibility 1
  6. PART I Beyond the Postmodern: Literature, Philosophy, and the Question of the Contemporary
  7. Editor’s Introduction 17
  8. 1 The Polymodern Condition: A Report on Cluelessness 22
  9. 2 Metamodernism: Period, Structure of Feeling, and Cultural Logic – A Case Study of Contemporary Autofiction 41
  10. 3 The Ends of Metafiction, or, The Romantic Time of Egan’s Goon Squad 55
  11. 4 Virtually Human: Posthumanism and (Post-)Postmodern Cyberspace in Gary Shteyngart ’s Super Sad True Love Story 74
  12. PART II Beyond the Subject: Posthuman and Nonhuman Literary Criticism
  13. Editor’s Introduction 97
  14. 5 Hélène Cixous’s So Close; or, Moving Matters on the Subject 102
  15. 6 Meillassoux, the Critique of Correlationism, and British Romanticism 122
  16. 7 Fictional Objects Fictional Subjects 138
  17. 8 On the Death of Meaning 152
  18. PART III Beyond the Object: Reading Literature through Actor-Network Theory, Object-Oriented Philosophy, and the New Materialisms
  19. Editor’s Introduction 173
  20. 9 Neither Billiard Ball nor Planet B: Latour’s Gaia, Literary Agency, and the Challenge of Writing Geohistory in the Anthropocene Moment 179
  21. 10 Three Problems of Formalism: An Object-Oriented View 198
  22. 11 A Field of Heteronyms and Homonyms: New Materialism, Speculative Fabulation, and Wor(l)ding 215
  23. 12 Emerson’s Speculative Pragmatism 234
  24. PART IV Ordinary Language Criticism: Reading Literature through Anglo-American Philosophy
  25. Editor’s Introduction 253
  26. 13 Two Examples of Ordinary Language Criticism: Reading Conant Reading Rorty Reading Orwell – Interpretation at the Intersection of Philosophy and Literature 258
  27. 14 Stanley Cavell and the Politics of Modernism 279
  28. 15 Inferentialist Semantics, Intimationist Aesthetics, and Walde 297
  29. PART V Embodiment as Ethics: Literature and Life in the Anthropocene
  30. Editor’s Introduction 315
  31. 16 Living to Tell the Story: Characterisation, Narrative Perspective, and Ethics in Climate Crisis Flood Novels 321
  32. 17 Contemporary Anthropocene Novels: Ian McEwan’s Solar, Jeanette Winterson’s The Stone Gods, Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood 338
  33. 18 The Day of the Dark Precursor : Philosophy, Fiction, and Fabulation at the End of the World – A Fictocritical Guide 361
  34. 19 So to Speak 382
  35. PART VI Politics after Discipline: Literature, Life, Control
  36. Editor’s Introduction 389
  37. 20 Literary Study’s Biopolitics 394
  38. 21 We Have Been Paranoid Too Long to Stop Now 410
  39. 22 Securing Neoliberalism: The Contingencies of Contemporary US Fiction 429
  40. 23 Automatic Art , Automated Trading: Finance, Fiction, and Philosophy 450
  41. Notes on Contributors 466
  42. Index 471
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