Metamodernism

As a critical category used to address and conceptualise the turns of contemporary literature and culture, metamodernism has emerged and gained impetus as an important area of academic research over the past ten years. This project's primary academic output is the first book-length study of contemporary poetry in relation to metamodernism, a critical category that has hitherto been almost exclusively applied to fiction, film and artworks. The monograph's specific intervention in relevant scholarly debates is to argue that metamodernist poetry - and metamodernist literature more widely - should be defined in terms of its 'enigmaticalness'. As Theodor Adorno argues in AESTHETIC THEORY (1970), the central enigmas of modern art are initiated through ambiguity, ambivalence and tricky 'Rätsel' ('puzzles'). Tony Pinkney also characterises modernist 'poetic' language as embracing enigmatic, and challenging, linguistic constructions: the metamodernist poets discussed in this book -including Geoffrey Hill, J. H. Prynne, Geraldine Monk and Sandeep Parmar - similarly attempt to 'revitalize' readers' understanding of poetry, and perceptions of reality. Metamodernist poetry also complies with what Pinkney terms the 'second modernist ideology' of a resistance to modernity in the form of popular culture, and the 'greyly "standardizing" pressures of its contemporary environment'. One example of this pressure occurred in 2011, when the previous Poet Laureate compared texting to poetry in order to argue for the latter's continuing relevance.
In addition to bringing this monograph to completion, this research project proposes to expand the Europe-wide success of my AHRC Research Network in Metamodernism significantly, transforming it into a global network of scholars via the development of a website, the establishment of formal governance structures and the launching of a digital journal, the coordination of future research symposia, and the publication of research articles by ECRs.
These developments respond directly to requests from academics in the US, Canada, South Africa, Australia, Finland, Russia and China, potential members of an expanded network who have all expressed an interest in hosting further events in their respective countries. The proposed future symposia, all co-hosted by resident ECRs, will take place across four continents: Africa, Australia, North America and Europe. This extended network will thus provide a unique opportunity to devise the research agenda on metamodernism on a global scale, and to provide intellectual leadership by formulating a timely and multidisciplinary response to what Linda Hutcheon has termed the difficult but urgent challenge of pinpointing a more exact 'label' for the post-postmodernist era.
Through the website, governance and journal, these ideas will be disseminated to a variety of audiences, including academics working in the area of contemporary literature, culture and art, but extending also to non-academics and creative practitioners such as architects, creative writers, and avant-garde artists. The project will traverse international boundaries in order to build new scholarly and creative collaborations, forging a multidisciplinary response to metamodernism. Participants will be drawn from the United States, Canada, South Africa, Japan, Russia, Australia, The Netherlands, Germany, China, Belgium, Sweden and Poland, collectively representing a broad range of disciplines that includes literary and cultural studies, American studies, women's studies, philosophy, sociology, film studies and fine art.