OUGD501: External Reading: Zygmunt Bauman

Individual and society and pioneer of the theory 'liquid modernity'.

Liquid modernity simply put, is the modernity of the present, wherever you are in time or history. One could argue that liquid modernity is just another term for 'contemporary', suggesting the modern evolution (societal) of the present day.

Zygmunt Bauman was a Polish sociologist and philosopher. His work exploring the refugee issue whilst a professor at Leeds University, and the rise of rightwing populism as a ‘crisis in humanity’. He once said  "See the world through the eyes of society’s weakest members, and then tell anyone honestly that our societies are good, civilised, advanced, free.". His work exploring the 'crisis in humanity' is slightly unrelated to graphic design, but when we read deeper into advertising, the representation of women and racial groups are coded with signifiers to keep each 

 Emma Palese, academic and writer for the U.S Library for Medicine discussed Bauman’s liquid modernity was a term that can "overcome the concept of postmodernism". 
She explores how life is constantly transitory: moving with us simultaneously but still temporary rather than with lasting, and its this utility is liquid modernity highest value, especially in the contemporary world. Its a constantly changing world– the fashions we follow, the events that spark interest in society and subcultures, the things we dream of and the things we fear. In Bauman's obituary on The Guardian written by journalists Mark Davis and Tom Campbell Bauman's work spoke of "an increasing polarisation between the elite and the rest, our growing tolerance of ever-expanding inequalities".



"Consumption has ambivalent features: it relieves the anxiety, because what one has, could not be taken back, but it also requires that consumers increasingly consume, since the previous consumption soon loses its rewarding peculiarity."