It was this promise to historically situate postmodernism in relation to transformations in the capitalist system and the development of global multinational capital that, for many like myself who at once embraced aspects of postmodern theory whilst remaining critical of its often ambiguous political stance, was probably the single most significant aspect of Jameson's theory. .
At the same time, however, the precise nature of the relationship between postmodernism as a cultural phenomenon and late capitalism as a system was left somewhat under-theorized and, for myself at least, this has remained one of the most troubling aspects of Jameson's theory of post modernity. That is to say, Jameson's notion of postmodernism as a cultural dominant, or the cultural "logic" of late capitalism. Very briefly there are three broad uses of the term, postmodernism or post modernity, to have emerged in the 1980s: firstly, as a cultural category, deriving mainly from debates in architecture but also applicable to the other arts and literature. In this sense postmodernism is defined in relation to modernism and specifically the high modernism of the inter- war years. The second sense concerns the notion of epistemic or epochal transition has taken place. That is, Lyotard's much heralded theory of the end of grand universalizing narratives. This is also linked to the specifically cultural definition of postmodernism through the idea that the arts can no longer associated with a wider socio-historical project of human emancipation. The whole Enlightenment project, argued Lyotard, has come to an end, how can we still meaningfully speak of human progress and the rational control of the life world after Auschwitz and Stalin's gulags. This seems to me to be a particularly spurious argument but perhaps we can return to it later. The third use of the term postmodernism has been to define, albeit rather imprecisely, some recent trends within French philosophy, particularly what have been called the "new Philosophies".