Jameson’s Marxism Hermeneutics Aesthetics

As the most famous representative of Marxism in North America, Jameson strongly believes that traditional Marxism still has important significance when west thought field experienced rigorous turbulence. He analyzes literature and culture phenomenon from economic foundation and superstructure according to Marxism basic principle. This dissertation is composed of four chapters:chapter one is an effort to construct Hegelian Marxism Hermeneutics framework; chapter two and three are the clarification of literature criticism and culture explanation under the Marxian Hermeneutics background; chapter four attempts to explore Jameson MarxianHermeneutics Aesthetics significance and limitation, meanwhile it brings up Marxism practice Aesthetics to fit China contemporary society.Chapter one:Jameson runs through this important concept of totality and relevant idea in his critical theory, which had been put forward by Satre’s《Dialectical Ration Critique》.Satre thinks that only historical materialism formed by Marx reasonably explains history, and history process expedition must orient on history monism which lets object itself dominate history research in order to show history totality movement, at the same time construct specific experience—based totality theory including society and history. Dialectics is dialect ration which is totality, that is revealed by human creating and involved in history as totality. Since this history is known for mankind, totality is practice, that is not machinery overall of particular activities, but all reflect among single movement. Satre’s totality dialectics, with individual its main body, based on psychoanalysis, in the background of existence philosophy, describes self-consciousness and existence state, which substitutes for objective material reality by means of phenomenon method. Satre’s history dialectics is just total dialectics, as his history view is the illumination of totality. For Jameson, totality considers history one whole, not a state of rest, which inspires his post-modernism criticism and globalization theory. Jameson literature criticism attaches importance on form and contents, who regards form and idea as political and ideological, form dialectical principal as content dominant for works.Chapter two:Meta—commentary as text declassification, which summarizes Jameson Marxism literature theory, restricts literature theory within text and convertes society reality to present text which can transform analysis object into text meaning, sentence structure composition, research mutual relations not relate them with object reality in order to avoid to be misleaded by tradition. Jameson thinks that Russia formalism fell into the prison house of language, which believes literature is equal to art style itself whose basic function is verfremdungseffekt. Jameson shows that history embodied in verfremdungseffekt is only still, and the idea does not reveal real history tendency. Structuralism excessively stresses text synchronic level, ignoring its diachronic thinking, that is text historic, social. For Marxism arts, the latter is the basis of all literature. As far as Jameson concerned, ideology,which emerges in literatural and art structure, and Utopia are the centre of his Marxism hermeneutics. Political ideology, potentially confining text,anti—reality, is under control contrary to text displaying meaning. As the centre of Jameson hermeneutics, narrative is not a literature form, but a unchangeable structure, a permanent category, wherewith people understand the world. Thereforth Jameson’s narrative not only manifests a esthetic form, within which social conflict is resolved by way of pure form in aesthetics domain; but imaginably reflects and solves social reality through aesthetic form. Narrative theory researches desire and fantasy expressed in it, but escape from reality, as well as ideology containment, where the relation of the text and history are oppressed and explanation emerges. Jameson whole criticism theory, seen as an example of Freud theory and Marxian word code conversion, seeks reconciliations of individual subject and collective history which enough represents about three-level text analysis. For Jameson code conversion firstly uses in researching text in the part history background of text, or the diachronic relation of between it and history; secondly, it analyses text among the text and class, producing text, treating it as a tool to legitimate dominion, or using it to send class ideology, as well as engaging synchronic and diachronic study; thirdly, it investigates text against text and the whole production mode, adopting a systematic and synchronic perspectives consideration of a larger historical view.Chapter three:Jameson involved in post—modernism is not accidental. If his early works establish Marxian literary criticism as the most compatible and comprehensive framework, integrating mutually exclusive theory into his analysis, as well as constructing Marxian double hermeneutics centred ideology criticism and utopian visions, then Jameson’s studies of postmodernism are read within the context of his earlier works and as their logical extension, that synthesize Marxian thought and post—modernism standpoints, conceptualize post—modernism within the development of capitalism, at the same time taking part in post—modernism in order to again think contemporary Marxian theory and politics. Jameson summarizes some characteristic of post—modern culture, that is the vanishing of depth, history, emotion, parody and pastiche. Space runs through Jameson post-modern culture criticism. For Jameson, post—modernism involves space-time and the shift of space-time experience. Contrary to modern space, post-modern means the absence of distance, which is critic distance, meta-physics depth, or late capitalism political economics dispersing. Jameson brings up "Cognitive mapping" as esthetics un theoretical. Jameson’s cognitive mapping synthesizes Lynch’s cognitive mapping and Althusser’s ideology, which focuses on wholly systematically understand capitalism society, and it is Jameson’s earlier Lucas narratives further extension. As far as Jameson and Lucas are concerned, narratives build the relation between different events, putting them in a wider context. For Jameson, the cognitive object is not city,but social structure, global social totality when we involve.Chapter four:It is only Jameson, who does not reconstruct Marxism as Frankfurt School did, that firmly confirms the rationality of Marxian principal, his thought based on it. But short of complete and thorough about Marx, Engels, he can’t understand Marx and Engels thought truly, exactly,deeply. It is a urgent problematic in front of Marxism aesthetics that Marxism hermeneutics aesthetics how to develop itself at the present age. Practice ontology advocated by Liu Gangji lays the most solid foundation of contemporary Marxian hermeneutics esthetics.