Modernism was the era of enlightenment and the search for the absolute truth in life by using science and logic to disclaim all the myths and past grand narratives. As we kept advancing in technology and expanding our knowledge of the universe around us we seemed only to confuse things more rather than finding the ultimate solution to everything. We believed that this conquest of never ending knowledge would bring us to be a happier people and possibly one day create a utopia. What did all this science and research bring us? It surely did not bring us happiness it actually lead to nuclear weapons and two World Wars. This truth that we were looking for through science did not bring us to this utopia we envisioned it actually happened to be just the opposite because it lead us to chaos and turmoil among opposing nations.
Now we are in the era of post-modernism. Post-modernism is a movement that ultimately contradicts the ideas of modernism, but post-modernist never say this because that would be a grand narrative in itself and they avoid the idea of central narrative because that becomes oppressive and there is always a minority. Post-modernism supports the idea that each different community has their own set of narratives that they live by because it fits to their culture. Also in the post-modern era the belief is that there is no actual truth that can serve everyone. Everybody has their own interpretation of life, and we all make understanding of life in different ways.
Cat's Cradle definitely serves as postmodern text because all the themes in the novel revolve around skepticism and what it actually true. For example, Newt becomes obsessive with the string game called Cat's Cradle and repeatedly states, "See the cat? See the cradle?" (Vonnegut 179). This statement is shows that there is no actually no cat and no cradle, but it is actually a bunch of X's that make no sense. This game of X's never ends. This metaphorically shows that life has no one truth, but we all see things in different ways and one person's truths can be another man's lies.
Super amazing post Jason! I like how you started explaining what modernism was and how it was the search for absolute truth in life through science and logic. However, the science and logic led us to become unhappy due to the invention of nuclear weapons. I also thought it was a good idea to then explain what postmodernism one. Especially the part where they can't say they are going against modernism since it would create a grand narrative. Then you wrapped it up with an awesome analysis of a quote. I was trying to analyze a similar quote to that, but i couldnt express what i meant, but you did, so awesome job!
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