Postmodern Times: A Critical Guide to the Contemporary ed. by Alison Lee, Thomas Carmichael (review)

HUMANITIES 405 moment in Canadian architecture: a preference for the formal vocabulary of modernism (however inflected by the introduction of new materials and construction techniques), a desire for a greater level of integration between built form and landscape, a related concern with the environmental and urbanistic implications of architectural construction, and, finally, a willingness to at once preserve and critically engage with what is most valuable in the existing built environment. One suspects that these concerns are not exclusive to the Canadian context. This raises a question: what, if anything, defines the specificity of contemporary Canadian architecture? Wang=s introductory essay offers no definitive response to that question. It does, however, go some distance in defining the forces that are currently shaping architectural culture in Canada, as in other nations on the periphery of the United States= global hegemony. In Wang=s view, three things may be thought to define the specificity of Canadian architecture at this historical juncture: its cultural location at the imaginary intersection of European and American values, its unique climatic and topographic conditions, and an ever-growing distance from what Wang describes as >true nature.= One might wish that Wang were clearer about just what he means by >true nature.= Nevertheless, his argument is, in the main, a convincing one (if marred by occasional terminological imprecision and other stylistic infelicities). Still more convincing is his discussion of specific projects, as when he shows how two works bearing superficial resemblance to one another, Ledbury Park and Rotary Park, reveal distinct architectonic sensibilities through their deployment of apparently insignificant details such as canopies and pergolae. Is there an identifiably Canadian architecture emerging from contemporary practice? Neither Wang=s essay nor the catalogue as a whole offers any definitive answer to that question. Perhaps it is less important that the question be answered than that it be periodically posed B and that robust, intelligent work, work like the projects represented in this catalogue, be offered in response. (ANDREW PAYNE) Alison Lee and Thomas Carmichael, editors. Postmodern Times: A Critical Guide to the Contemporary Northern Illinois Univeirsty Press. viii, 272. US $36.00 The editors of this collection wisely decide not to rehash the tired debate about how to define postmodernism. As the title indicates, the only parameters shared among the thirteen essays are chronological. In spite of its own suspicion towards periodization, postmodernism here is primarily a period term, loosely comprising the last five decades of the twentieth century, and most of the essays focus more on the relationship between postmodernism and modernism than on current practices. A glance at the index confirms the impression that modernism is the >norm= against which 406 LETTERS IN CANADA 2000 postmodernism is measured; there are more references to modernist theorists, artists, and writers than to postmodern ones. This to some extent belies the claim made in the subtitle; the term >contemporary,= here implicitly equated with >postmodern,= is more likely to be understood to mean >current= by most readers. The label >guide= suggests that the book will serve as a practical tool for readers in need of navigational aid in the maze of current cultural practices. This uncertainty of purpose continues in the introduction, which defines the collection as both a >provisional summing up= of and an >introduction to advanced postmodernism.= Neither editors nor authors can be blamed for the inevitable time lag inherent in a medium as conservative as a book, with its dependence on a slow publishing apparatus, which effectively precludes the radical simultaneity of truly postmodern media. Still, this is not enough to explain the impression of datedness that reigns over the collection as a whole. What we get here is a retrospective of a conservative, white, and Western phenomenon that, it seems, played itself out well before the end of the century. The rationale behind the selection and organization of the essays remains a bit of a mystery. They cover a wide range of topics, subdivided into seemingly random categories. The editors= claim to >throw into relief the major sites of postmodern reconfiguration= is only partly borne out, unless opera and cuisine can be considered as major sites on a par with shifts in the understanding of subjectivity, technology...