Jean Baudrillard

• Jean Baudrillard was born on the 27th July 1929 in Reims on the northeastern coast of France, developing into a French sociologist, philosopher, cultural theorist, political commentator and a photographer. This work gave him a high status, due to it being widely developed and acknowledged within the medium of postmodernism and post-structuralism
• During high school, he became absorbed within pataphysics, which is a combination of metaphysicis (nature and being of the world), referring to nonsensical language, meaning a written text that is written or spoken in human language but lacks any coherent meaning. It is thought that these early studies relate to his later thoughts.
• He later went on to become a teacher of the German language and literature, which was transferred into sociology, referring to his most known book, ‘Le Système des objets’, meaning ‘The System of Objects’.
• His theories may relate to his travels, which include many to the USA, and in 1973, to Japan (Kyoto). Whilst here, he was gave his first camera, which led to his famous photography.
• In 1986, he moved to IRIS (Institut de Recherche et d'Information Socio-Économique) at the Université de Paris-IX Dauphine, where he spent the majority of his teaching career. Through this, he moved away from sociology, in order to discipline himself – in a ‘classical’ form. He then went on to teach full time.
• He continued to write books during the 1980s and 90s – published in both French and English - which gained a wider audience, contributing to his popularity, almost earning the status of ‘intellectual celebrity’ in his final years.
• His best work was known for analyzing mediation and technological communication, as he was a social theorist. He covered a variety of topics through his writing, such as the effects of social changes, consumerism, gender relations, social understanding towards history, journalistic commentaries (AIDS and cloning, for example), and world-wide disasters, such as the Gulf War and the attack upon the World Trade Center - for example, he thought these global phenomenons did not happen, even calling the World Trade Centre a 'dark fantasy'. From this, we can relate this to film, with the use of editing being exposed into the media to reflect what we are 'told' what happened, in comparison to actually experiencing the problem. Therefore, these events could not have actually happened unless we experienced them personally.

• His work inspired many post-structuralism followers, as his work combines philosophy with sociology. His theories followed similarities alongside theirs, such as the meaning behind something brought systems of signs working together. For example, Baudrillard believed a word – such as ‘dog’ – can be argued to relate to the absence of the word, such as not just what it says, but what it does not say – e.g. ‘cat’ – as objects, images, words and signs are ‘situated in a web of meaning.’ For example, we can only understand one word’s meaning through its relation to the meaning of other objects. Therefore, if things were not seen, they did not happen.
• From this, he could construct broad theories upon human society, with images always relating/searching for other meanings. Therefore, there is not a total understanding of our world, and therefore part of it always remains elusive. ‘Formations of knowledge, therefore, only emerge from the result of its relations to power’. From this, Baudrillard developed theories that searching for total knowledge lead to an inevitable delusion. Therefore, understandings try to be solved, but relations to the understand need to be overcome firstly, therefore producing an unsolved web of desirable yet impossible results.
• He concludes that a complete understanding of human life is impossible. When individuals think otherwise, they become involved in a “simulated” version of reality, relating to “hyper reality” – not an unreal world, but a fast-paced society that force a logical picture, although add to a pressured, insecure society, making reality ‘die out’.
• He notes in the late 20th century, the world is far more petrified, disclosing Marxists and liberal followers, with the smallest event now being emphasized as something dramatic: adding to Marshall McLuhan’s “global village” phrase. As the ‘globe’ now focuses on the exchange or merchandise, blindness highlights symbolic acts such as terrorism, adding to this scare. He believes that consumption – therefore greed – is what drives the capitalist society, differing from Marx’s theory upon production being the thrive. Contributing to this, he notes that – likewise to Francis Fukuyama – history has ended or ‘vanished’ due to the spread of globalization, adding that this could be the collapse of the idea of historical progress.
• Baudrillard died on March 6th 2007, aged 77, in Paris, France. His ideas and expressions have been noted within postmodernism history.