The individual or subject depicted in these works is often decentred, without a central meaning or goal in life, and dehumanized, often losing individual characteristics and becoming merely the representative of an age or civilization, like Tiresias in The Waste Land. That is, these works are consciously ambiguous and give way to multiple interpretations. Modernist and Postmodernist works are also fragmented and do not easily, directly convey a solid meaning.
Parody and pastiche serve to highlight the self-reflexivity of Modernist and Postmodernist works, which means that parody and pastiche serve to remind the reader that the work is not “real” but fictional, constructed. Both these schools also employed pastiche, which is the imitation of another’s style. Such mixing of different, incongruous elements illustrates Postmodernism’s use of lighthearted parody, which was also used by Modernism. Postmodernism even goes a step further and deliberately mixes low art with high art, the past with the future, or one genre with another. Both schools reject the rigid boundaries between high and low art. Postmodernism shares many of the features of Modernism. It has often been said that Postmodernism is at once a continuation of and a break away from the Modernist stance. Modernism was an earlier aesthetic movement which was in vogue in the early decades of the twentieth century. The very term Postmodernism implies a relation to Modernism. Postmodernism can be associated with the power shifts and dehumanization of the post- Second World War era and the onslaught of consumer capitalism. It is generally agreed that the postmodern shift in perception began sometime back in the late 1950s, and is probably still continuing. Postmodernism broadly refers to a socio-cultural and literary theory, and a shift in perspective that has manifested in a variety of disciplines including the social sciences, art, architecture, literature, fashion, communications, and technology.
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