source file: mills2.txt Date: Tue, 7 Nov 1995 12:20:57 -0800 Subject: Re: Message from Internet From: alves@osiris.ac.hmc.edu (Bill Alves) > Brian's mention of Modernism makes me think of a question about the arts in >general: Is this the first time in history when we've managed to progress past >the current "modern" era into something recognizably different ("post-modern") >without ever coming up with a name for the "modern" era? > > The theory behind this question of course is the ... abstraction at >least ... >that every era - Baroque, Classical, whatever - was viewed as modern until they >thought up another word for it. This is true in the sense that modern means contemporary. However, ModernISM to me means something much more specific. It refers to an aesthetic in which being MODERN, and, hence, innovative, becomes a priority. Thus things that refer to the past, if only a few years in the past, become "backward-looking" or "conservative." While this is an oversimplification, as are all labels, and doesn't take into account movements like neoclassicism, it does aptly describe a major preoccupation around the beginning of this century. By the way, few if any of the familiar historical labels we use were in use (at least in the same way) at the times we associate with them now. And, of course, their usage has evolved quite differently in music, art, literature, and philosophy (witness the current confusion about the way postmodernism is used by philosophers and literary critics and the way it is used in music, literature, and the visual arts). ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^ Bill Alves email: alves@hmc.edu ^ ^ Harvey Mudd College URL: http://www2.hmc.edu/~alves/ ^ ^ 301 E. Twelfth St. (909)607-4170 (office) ^ ^ Claremont CA 91711 USA (909)621-8360 (fax) ^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Received: from eartha.mills.edu [144.91.3.20] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Wed, 8 Nov 1995 05:19 +0100 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id TAA29692; Tue, 7 Nov 1995 19:19:51 -0800 Date: Tue, 7 Nov 1995 19:19:51 -0800 Message-Id: Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu