Modernism vs Postmodernism

• Industrialisation - the use of technology for the manufacture of standardised goods for the mass marked. Manual workers with jobs for life
• Social class is the main form of social division and source of identity
• Culture reflects the class structure
• Politics centre around social structural class interests and is focussed around political parties and governments
• Nation-states, national economies and national identities predominate
• The mass media is concerned with one way communication and reflects the basic social reality.
• Tradition, religion, magic and superstition are replaced by rational thought and scientific theories. These are seen as superior forms of knowledge.
• Scientific knowledge and scientific and technological progress are seen as forces for good.
• Sociology developed to try to understand and explain society whilst using the same scientific methods as the natural sciencesd
• Functionalism and Marxism developed as structural theories that used scientific methods.

• Wider consumer choice with manual work replaced by the service economy. Jobs for life disappear.
• Consumption, media images and lifestyle become major sources of identity. We can pick 'n' mix multiple identities
• Culture becomes more diverse and fragmented
• Politics become more personalised and linked to diversity. Party politics are displaced by identity politics (i.e. gay, ethnic and religious politics).
• New social movements emerge based on personal concerns rather than structural influences
• Nation-states and national identities are displaced by gloabisation - global products, global media and global marketing.
• Society becomes dominated by new global interactive media (i.e. social networking sites and electronic communication).
• The mass media creates our sense of reality
• All forms of knowledge are equally valid

CONT.

• There is a loss of faith in the certainty, rational thought and scientific and technological progress of modernism
• Science and technology often cause rather than solve problems. There is a growing scepticism about the idea of progress and science as a force for good.
• Society can no longer be understood through the application of perspectives that seek to explain society as a whole (e.g. Functionalism and Marxism) because society has become fragmented into so many  different groups, and interests and lifestyles are constantly changing.
• There are few of the social constraints on people that structuralist approaches identify and social structures no longer exist.