A new era comes with new acronyms for new phenomena. We have already commented on the rise of the BRICs, which is an apt shorthand for Brasil, Russia, India and China, the economic powers to be (or that be). Yet there are also less flattering acronyms around. What to think of the PI(I)GS, for example. It …
The postmodern years have been marked by a slow but steady development towards political stability and economic prosperity, at least from a western perspective. After the turmoil of the 1960s and, to a lesser extent, the 1970s and, to a much lesser extent, the 1980s, the 1990s might be described, in the words of Charles …
Contemporary architectural practices do not seem to fit yesteryear’s conceptuali-zations of the modern and the postmodern.Whereas modern architecture (1920s-1960s) was dedicated to the possibility of utopia and the ideal of universal progress, postmodern architecture (1970s onwards) either lost all confidence in societal change, or didn’t feel the need to adhere to a wider social agenda. …
Last week the US Senate passed the Financial Reform Bill. After decades of Neoliberal deregulation, the legislation intends to re-regulate the free-floating financial system which was at the root of the 2008 crisis. Symbolically, therefore, the bill signals the end of the postmodern (late-capitalist) years of unbridled lending and unfettered trading. As CNN Money aptly …
Over the last few years it has become increasingly clear that contemporary architecture, like so many other aesthetic practices, is no longer postmodern. Although one could also point towards somewhat more stylistic changes (and we will definitely do so in later posts), the end of the postmodern is most clearly signaled here by the return …
