Baudrillard, and how to offend me...

For my GAS presentation in a few days time I have been researching Baudrillard who to sum up was a "one of the most famous and controversail writers on postmodernism" (to quote "Jean Baudrillard" by Richard J. Lane). I found an amazing passage on the "Hyperreal" that I thought I would share with you all.

"Baudrillard argues that there are three levels of simulation, where the first level is an obvious copy of the reality and the second level is a copy so good that it blurs the boundaries between reality and representation. The third level is one that produces a reality of its own without being based upon any particular bit of the real world."

It continues to explain deeper into it all but I thought that one piece alone was a brilliant passage. Im talking about the 2nd level a lot in my presentation.

Anyways, Richard J. Lane, the author of the book continues a while afterwards to explain more about everything and says something that at first I found funny but then thought, shit, thats just summed me up. Here is what he says:

"An example of "absolute" speed is the contemporary publie-road "sports car", which actually goes slower than, or at the same speed as, a turbo-charged family saloon; the family of the saloon looks like the slower of the two and would never be owned by someone who wants to be indentified as "living in the fast lane".

I have a "sports car"! Ok so it is a sporty looking hatchback but still, it looks great and it does actually look slightly quicker then it goes I think but its like, he just summed me up! Heh ah well.

I think people who are interested in Hyperreality and such things should look more into Baudrillard and his later writings. I say "later" because some of his early stuff is much more focused on Marxism and how he reworks it all.

Anyways, work to be done...