Globalization, Networks and Post Modernity

Poststructuralism operates on the notion that power is circuitous than it is linear and structured. Structuralism, at its core, concerns how language works as a system of meaningful production. Structuralists are more concerned with how language articulates itself as a science. In this manner, structuralism is a more archeological study where poststructuralism is genealogical, concerned with uncovering the relationship of power and discourse on the mind and body. However, Poststructuralists concentrate on how language expresses truth beyond text which itself holds no significant meaning. Poststructuralism deconstructs our language system revealing it as a form of power that makes use of arbitrary symbols to communicate meaning, but also assume hierarchal structure and organization: How was language used to enlighten modern society? Poststructuralists have an aversion to clean-cut positivist definitions and classifications because the overall nature of language is to be defined. In order to give meaning to language, language must be used to define the foundational assumptions being expressed to clarify on the core definition. As a result, linear definitions do not and cannot apply. This may be why Michel Foucault rejected the sole title of a “poststructuralist” although he largely lays the groundwork for poststructuralism, insisting on its circular nature in which knowledge reinforces “truth”, which assumes power. Foucault finds that truth games are grabs for power in which individuals convey a truth through use of historical resources and specificity to express its legitimacy, which encapsulates modern society and its practices in discourse. What Foucault examines and critiques is society’s oft unhealthy yet habitual dalliance ...

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...We have simulated and innovated a “better” world--an ideal type in which our physical reality does not measure up. Since we are subjective beings, we have a need for meaning. We assume that we are progressing towards some sort of meaning, but progress is never done, although our bodies will be one day, as finite creatures. As far as I can see, the overall goal of “modern” society is to conquer the infinite within ourselves, which is so much more complex than what language can fully express--it’s pretty much intangible. This is why we have so many linear categories--ways to organize. One might have transient moments of progress within themselves; however, they are not moments that can be elucidated without the process of dilution through language and text. We cannot do what the things we made can do and we might hate ourselves for it. Natural human error, I suppose.