Postmodernism A Reader

The arguments over postmodernism are among the most important intellectual debates of our time. Going beyond the poststructuralist controversy in its interdisciplinary scope, postmodernism questions the fundamental civil, political, ethical, and cultural criteria that make criticism and theory available, necessary, legitimate, or, indeed, even possible. But given that the key texts are widely scattered, the broad range of arguments remains relatively unknown.

Postmodernism: A Reader gathers in one volume a comprehensive selection of articles, essays, and statements by leading figures -- among them Lyotard, Habemas, Jameson, Baudrillard, Eco, and Rorty -- writing across the divergent terrains on which the struggles over postmodernism are taking place: in the fields of philosophy and politics, in the artistic and cultural avant-garde, architecture and urbanicity, feminism and ecology, and in the Third world. The material assembled here enables a serious and rigorous consideration of the question "Are we at -- and should we endore -- the end of modernity?"

Thomas Doherty is professor of english at Trinity College, Dublin. He is the author of Reading (Absent) Character; John Donne Undone; On Modern Authority; and After Theory: Postmodernism/Postmarxism.