Humans have a tendency towards classification—Renaissance, Romantic, Modern, Post-Modern, Contempory—but those who lived to see those great movements scarcely realized how singularly their achievements would be viewed. The question I pose to my generation is this: how, and by what, will we be remembered? What will the here an now be called once we have passed the torch to the next generation?
Lyotard referred to the “collapse of the meta-narrative” as a symptom of post-modernity, where the once unifying traditions of one religion or one culture can no longer provide the sole source of direction for our lives, due to the effects of globalization and pluralism. For myself, the lyric “I’m living in an age whose name I don’t know,” from The Arcade Fire’s My Body Is A Cage exemplifies this loss of identity.
I propose that we can no longer define ourselves by limited philosophies—we are not modern; we are not post-modern—but merely by the time in which we are alive: The 21st Century. The 21c is an agnostic term, it comes unloaded with baggage and meaning: it is amorphous, and—for at least another 91-some years—will be perfectly applicable to all our human endeavors.
I think our age will be known for redefining culture, as Lyotard said, as all cultures and religions slowly melding together.
It’s interesting to think about, that you are writing history at the same time you record it… woo…. makes me dizzy…