
LITERATURE AND POST-TRUTH
Author(s) -
Yaroslav Polishchuk
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
slovo ì čas
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2707-0557
pISSN - 0236-1477
DOI - 10.33608/0236-1477.2020.06.57-71
Subject(s) - postmodernism , rhetoric , context (archaeology) , dehumanization , ideology , sociology , aesthetics , political science , law , social science , epistemology , history , politics , philosophy , linguistics , archaeology
The author examines the current state of literature, which has been marginalized by the boom of modern media and the free market. Literature is called to restore a worthy place in the system of cultural communication of society. It is contradicted by the experience of postmodernism, which has led to disorientation in the system of art values. Postmodernism was an important formation of the transition period. Three aspects of the postmodern worldview ― dehumanization of art, lack of truths' hierarchy and their plurality, and the loss of the author’s authority ― have led to a long-lasting crisis in the post-Soviet literatures, but in the wider context, it was a crisis of relations with society and public opinion. The continuation of this crisis is stimulated by the use of technologies aimed at producing the post-truth. In the contemporary world, dominated by mass media and popular culture, fiction is not fully responsible for the crisis of society. The author of the paper considers examples that confirm the relevance of literature to ideological conflicts and propaganda rhetoric. The novelties of Ukrainian, Russian, and Belarusian literatures provide good material for the study of the post-truth in its Eastern European modifications. Nowadays fiction is seeking its place once again; its potential means of influencing the human consciousness in the post-truth world are being renewed. This process should be seen dialectically, with its probable positive and negative consequences. The post-truth world gives literature a chance to leave the shadows of media and restore its authority in the cultural sphere. At the same time, the confluence of literary fiction with post-truth poses a considerable danger, since it may be applied in modern manipulative technologies. The establishment of social and psychological communication, which became one of the priority tasks of modern literature, should not be implemented at the cost of human degradation.