Is history meaningful? Does it have a direction or a purpose? This course introduces the concept of postmodernism and explores its intellectual origins and artistic expression, within the larger context of the collapse of Communism at the end of the twentieth century and the current crisis of liberalism. Students read works and excerpts from works such as Foucault, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History”; Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition; Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation; Jameson, Postmodernism; Gray, Liberalism; Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man; and Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed.
‍Prerequisite:  ALT 1060