The Passing of Postmodernism: A Spectroanalysis of the Contemporary

Contents

Contents Acknowledgments ix 1. The Phantom Project Returning: The Passing (On) of the Still Incomplete Project of Modernity 1 Introduction 1 Ruptures and Specters 7 Exorcisms Without End 18 The (Phantom) Project Still Incomplete 23 2. Spectral Circumventions (of the Specter): Poststructuralism, Derrida, and the Project Renewed 37 Poststructuralism and/as Postmodernism 37 Private Irony All the Way Down? 45 The Force of Derrida’s Indecision 61 3. Writing of the Ghost (Again): The Failure of Postmodern Metafiction and the Narrative of Renewalism 75 Neither Logocentric nor Logo Centric 75 From an Ethics of Perversity to an Ethics of Indecision 89 Metafiction’s Failure and the Rise of Neo-Realism 106 The Project of Renewalism 124 A Conclusion . . . Perhaps 137 Notes 147 Works Cited 183 Index 193 viii The Passing of Postmodernism ...