Postmodern philosophy

[Eric Frey]

What are the "must reads" to understand postmodern philosophy?

[John Reilly]

Post modern philosophy has been affected my many people like Nietzsche and Kant. Christianity lives in parallel with postmodernism so I would suggest for all Nazarenes reading Missio Dei (Schwanz, Keith and Joseph Coleson, Editors. Missio Dei, A Wesleyan Understanding. Kansas City: Beacon Hill Press, 2011.) edited by Coleson and Schwanz with contributors by many NTS faculty. This book gives Nazarenes a center from which to consider the affects of postmodernity on our church and culture today.

[Charles W Christian]

Stan Grenz's neat little book called a Primer on Post-Modernism is a good start. Good overview....

CWC

[Doug Ward]

What are the "must reads" to understand postmodern philosophy?

It really doesn't matter, since each book, and each opinion is equally correct. It would be wrong of me to value one book above any other. And when you consider that language has no inherent meaning, only whatever we the readers bring to it, it seems like a pointless exercise.

[Todd Erickson]

It helps to have a fair grounding in existentialism before approaching post-modernity, I think.

[Ryan Scott]

James K A Smith has a small book - "Who's Afraid of Post-modernism" which is an excellent introduction to postmodern philosophers. You need a strong understanding of philosophical lingo, but it's great for what it is.

[Benjamin Burch]

It helps to have a fair grounding in existentialism before approaching post-modernity, I think.

Yes! I have suggested Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments and Heidegger's Being and Time to Eric privately, as a means of understanding the initial movement from modernity to postmodernity.

[Benjamin Burch]

If others are curious, I suggested the following people to Eric generally:

Martin Heidegger
Jacques Derrida
Emmanuel Levinas
Edmund Husserl
Friedrich Nietchze
Michel Foucault
John D. Caputo
Jean-Luc Marion
Karl Barth

Given other things Eric has informed me about his inquiry, I have suggested the following works to him:


Jacques Derrida - Given Time
Jacques Derrida - "To Forgive The Unforgivable and the Imprescriptible" (in Questioning God edited by John D. Caputo).

Jean-Luc Marion - God Without Being
Jean-Luc Marion - Erotic Phenomenon
Jean-Luc Marion - In Excess: Studies of Saturated Phenomena
Jean-Luc Marion - Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness
Jean-Luc Marion - The Visible and the Revealed

Karl Barth - Church Dogmatics vol.1 - The Doctrine of the Word of God

William T. Cavanaugh - Torture and Eucharist
William T. Cavanaugh - Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire

Søren Kierkegaard - Practice in Christianity

[Steven Burton]

You ever wonder if people actually understand Nietchze when they use his quote about God?

[Craig Laughlin]

You ever wonder if people actually understand Nietchze when they use his quote about God?

I know he gave me headaches when I was in school. Not sure I would go so far as to say I really understood but if there is enough of a grade riding on it one can get at least familiar.

[Steven Burton]

I understood him to be talking from a philosophical view point in terms of how society had progressed when he made that saying. Not so much God is dead, but as God within society is dead. Of coursed I have not read him full due to only take very few philosophy classes, but that was the general idea I got from him in those classes.

[John Reilly]

Interesting thread. Certainly the post modern philosophies have profoundly affected our culture. Technically we have emerged from the post modern era into the "Technology Era" and we now live in the "Information Era." Both the technology era and the information era have been profoundly shaped by post modernism. In our "Information Era" of our culture we see an insatiable appetite for INSTANT information. There is a generalized anxiety in our culture affected by the constant stimuli of instant information in the form of instant messages, smart phones, i-pads, which all contributes to a shortening attention span which means that students need constant techno-information through video which makes the spoken sermon obsolete, and by now you have lost your attention span reading this thread and fell asleep. This past week, I turned off my computer and cell phone in my very best penmanship I hand wrote a few notes of encouragement and put a stamp on them put them in the mailbox realizing the mail lady had already been to the church mailbox so my notes would not be picked up until the next day and at best be delivered a few days later but I need to practice the timely art of patience.. Personally I am still encouraged by ink on printed notecard. This past week I received two thank yo note sand a card of congratulations. I place them on the edge of a book case in my office and I read them over again. This past Saturday I celebrated the retirement of a friend and at this celebration I practiced the lost art of face to face conversation with a college friend I have not seen in over ten years. As we lamented our busyness, my friend said, "All the technology we now have as added demands on my time." Forty years ago the great promise of technology was to free us to have more leisure time. The problem with technology and information is that culture and society demands more of both.

[Billy Cox]

You ever wonder if people actually understand Nietchze when they use his quote about God?

In my experience, people understand Nietchze's quote to the same degree that they understand John Lennon's quote about being more popular than Jesus Christ. In other words...not even a little bit.

But the quote(s) have a really high 'boogeyman coefficient' for sermonizing.

[Susan Unger]

Interesting thread. Certainly the post modern philosophies have profoundly affected our culture. Technically we have emerged from the post modern era into the "Technology Era" and we now live in the "Information Era." Both the technology era and the information era have been profoundly shaped by post modernism. In our "Information Era" of our culture we see an insatiable appetite for INSTANT information. There is a generalized anxiety in our culture affected by the constant stimuli of instant information in the form of instant messages, smart phones, i-pads, which all contributes to a shortening attention span which means that students need constant techno-information through video which makes the spoken sermon obsolete, and by now you have lost your attention span reading this thread and fell asleep. This past week, I turned off my computer and cell phone in my very best penmanship I hand wrote a few notes of encouragement and put a stamp on them put them in the mailbox realizing the mail lady had already been to the church mailbox so my notes would not be picked up until the next day and at best be delivered a few days later but I need to practice the timely art of patience.. Personally I am still encouraged by ink on printed notecard. This past week I received two thank yo note sand a card of congratulations. I place them on the edge of a book case in my office and I read them over again. This past Saturday I celebrated the retirement of a friend and at this celebration I practiced the lost art of face to face conversation with a college friend I have not seen in over ten years. As we lamented our busyness, my friend said, "All the technology we now have as added demands on my time." Forty years ago the great promise of technology was to free us to have more leisure time. The problem with technology and information is that culture and society demands more of both.

After taking several online classes this year I decided to take a technology fast for the summer. The first few days were just plain awful. And then the fudging over when it was necessary to be on the computer started in. Now, a month into my 'fast' here I still am...I've given up on excuses and just admit that I can't leave my internet friends. But, I am better. I will leave after a few minutes or will even shut the thing off after dinner. Baby steps I guess.

And I don't have a smart phone. I crave one during a power outage or when a hurricane or blizzard is in the area. But I still have some neo-ludditism within me giving me the strength to resist.

[Steven Burton]

Technology is about the only avenue I have to keep in touch with friends. With out I could not drive and meet friends at their home or vice versa. Sometimes I wonder if technology is the way it is because it is now able to keep up with the human mind. I know people who are the same way with books that I am with technology.

[Roy Richardson]

Stan Grenz's neat little book called a Primer on Post-Modernism is a good start. Good overview....

CWC

I second that

[Eric Frey]

Given other things Eric has informed me about his inquiry, I have suggested the following works to him:


Jacques Derrida - Given Time
Jacques Derrida - "To Forgive The Unforgivable and the Imprescriptible" (in Questioning God edited by John D. Caputo).

Jean-Luc Marion - God Without Being
Jean-Luc Marion - Erotic Phenomenon
Jean-Luc Marion - In Excess: Studies of Saturated Phenomena
Jean-Luc Marion - Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness
Jean-Luc Marion - The Visible and the Revealed

Looks like a crash course in French might be in order?

[Benjamin Burch]

I assumed there were English translations of each, and have been for everything I've read...

[Hans Deventer]

Looks like a crash course in French might be in order?

Forget it. It's going to be tough reading even in your native language. At least, that goes for JLM.

[Eric Frey]

I assumed there were English translations of each, and have been for everything I've read...

Susan got the poor attempt at humor. I assume as well there are English translations!