Page 206 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

production and reproduction 1507

writers on what will (or should) occur after this death of
history varies, and most do not say anything at all on the Production and
subject.This is because dictating an “after” equates to the
presentation of an endpoint, a concept that is too uni- Reproduction
versalist for postmodernism. Some may see humans
engaged in emancipatory aporia (living lives of radical roduction is the way by which human communities
undecidability, unrestrained by moral, and historio- Psatisfy their needs for food, clothing, and shelter.
graphical norms), whereas others see us engaged in con- Reproduction is the way by which generations of people
versations unrestrained by purpose and endpoint. succeed generations through births and deaths. Popula-
tion growth is fundamental to the human record.As one
Marnie Hughes-Warrington
generation has succeeded another, world population has
See also Modernity grown from mere tens of thousands at the beginnings of
humanity to more than 6 billion today.
In history three basic systems of production and repro-
Further Reading duction existed: hunting-gathering (or foraging), agri-
Barthes, R. (1968). The death of the author. In S. Heath (Ed. & Trans.), culture, and industry. A variant of agriculture was
Image, music, text (pp. 142–148). London: Fontana.
Dirlik, A. (2000). Postmodernity’s histories:The past as legacy and proj- pastoralism, the tending of domesticated herds of her-
ect. New York: Rowman and Littlefield. bivorous livestock. We should keep in mind some con-
Domanska, E. (1999). Universal history and postmodernism. Storia della
Storiagrafia, 35, 129–139. cepts: (1) These systems are theoretical. Real living
Elton, G. (1991). Return to essentials. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Uni- societies were almost never pure examples of one system
versity Press. or another. Even highly advanced industrial societies dur-
Greenblatt, S. (1990).Towards a poetics of culture. In Learning to curse:
Essays in early modern culture (pp. 146–160). London: Routledge. ing the twenty-first century depend on agriculture. Most
Jenkins, K. (2003). Refiguring history. London: Routledge. modern societies also have elements of foraging, for
Klein, K. L. (1995). In search of narrative mastery: Postmodernism and
the people without history. History and Theory, 34(4), 275–298. example, sea fishing and timber industries. (2) Each sys-
Lyotard, J.-F. (1984). The postmodern condition: A report on knowledge tem represents a stage in history. Foraging was by far the
(G. Bennington & B. Massumi, Ed. and Trans.). Minneapolis: Uni- most enduring system of production, from the begin-
versity of Minnesota Press.
Mazlish, B. (1993). Global history in a postmodernist era? In B. Mazlish nings of humanity to about 9000 BCE.Agriculture devel-
& R. Buultjens (Eds.), Conceptualizing global history (pp. 113–127). oped and became prevalent after 9000 BCE, industry
Boulder, CO: Westview.
Pomper, P., Elphick, R. H., & Vann, R. T. (1998). World history: Ideolo- after 1750 CE. (3) Each of these systems was developmen-
gies, structures and identities. Oxford, UK: Blackwell. tal and geographically variable. Human inventiveness led
Southgate, B. (2003). Postmodernism in history: Fear or freedom? Lon- to occasional improvements in the technologies of pro-
don: Routledge.
Stuchtey, B., & Fuchs, E. (2003). Writing world history, 1800–2000. duction, with corresponding adjustments in reproductive
Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. behavior. The systems of foraging, agriculture, or indus-
Thompson, W. (2004). Postmodernism and history. London: Palgrave
Macmillan. try in a given region depended upon the climate and
resource base. (4) Each stage in history began some-
where and spread elsewhere. Each stage represented a
successful technological breakthrough, which resulted in
increased production. (5) More production invariably
Printing meant more people, that is, more reproduction. Besides
needing food, clothing, and shelter, humans, like other
See Communication—Overview; Libraries; Mass Media; successful species, have biological and psychological
Paper; Writing Systems and Materials urges to be sexual and to nurture their young, which,