I like the German word Geschicte because it has two brilliant meanings. On the one hand it means "history", and on the other hand it means "story." Americans generically view the two words differently. When asked "Tell me about your father," you are being asked to provide facts. When asked "Tell me your story," you are being asked for an interpretation. I like the German word because it converges the two ideas: interpretation utlizes facts while facts are the elements of interpretation.
The metanarrative storyline has been the dominant, interpretive methodology of Modern culture. The metanarrative converges the "little" histories into an overarching history so that the "little" histories are subject to the interpretive structure of the overarching drama. The "nationalist" story form is a metanarrative: the "story" of the nation provides the lens through which ancillary stories (the stories of the "other" nations) are contextualized. The Christian metanarrative is a salvation-based plot of creation-fall-redemption (or some similar version). For example, within this overarching framework the English primarily founded America to be a "city on a hill" for all other nations to follow as well as the African-American primarily being brought to America to "hear the Gospel and be saved."
Similarly, this structure is replicated in most relational structures, too, so that marriage is a "sanctifying" ordinance and children are to be "blessed" if they endorse parental values. In this view the government's basic function is to punish the "bad" and to reward the "good", therefore, perpetuating justice (the righting of wrong). Even in the church, "discipleship" emphasizes salvific replication until the "earth is full of the glory of the Lord like the waters cover the sea." Another way to say it is that the metanarrative determines the history, the story.
The metanarrative is not an invalid way of looking at history. It is, however, not only invalid but dangerous when viewed as the absolutely only perspective. To do this is to equate this "one" narrative to the "deductive" perspective of God. Such is the replication of Platonic or gnostic heresy where one finite perspective is elevated above others, rendering the others not only susbtantially inferior but morally inferior (aka, ungodly). A singularly strict interpretation of the metanarrative exacerbates the POMO's panic over determinism, namely genetic inheritance. It is a trait of the POMO to pierce, tatt, and otherwise alter himself. The POMO reads a suffocating determinism into an absolute metanarrative interpretation of history. Simply put, the POMO tries to transcend the "story" given him by his Modern ancestor by "marking" himself in a way that genetic inheritance or DNA cannot replicate. Look at the Goth who paints his face a deathly pallor or the crumper who masks himself with clown paint or the increase in symbolic tatts or piercings in significant places like the eyebrow, lip, tongue, nipple, navel, etc. Understand that these are all forms of circumcision, and circumcision was originally introduced as an imposition upon the human body that transcends genetic inheritance. The symbolic alteration of his body is one way that the POMO distinguishes himself from his Modern parent. For the POMO it is freedom. It is a new beginning. He is creating a new person, a new people, a new story.
So the POMO rejects the metanarrative or is fine with the metanarrative so long as it is accompanied by the interpretation of several "micronarratives", lessening the absolutist implication of the metanarrative. The POMO arrives at truth by the correlation of micronarratives (personalized stories); so the POMO will generalize the similar ideas common to each micronarrative. For example, the POMO will look at the creation narratives of several people-groups and conclude that all people-groups have a creation narrative or story that embodies their own particular primordial values. Or they will look at the religions of various people groups and ascertain that Jesus is to Allah what Allah is to Eastern consciousness and so on. The POMO then concludes that 1) the tendency in every people group is to deify a personality, and that 2) the desire to worship a deity is inherently human.
Notice how in this micronarrative the content is important to the specific people-groups, but not necessarily important to the whole (global). In other words, the micronarrative says that it is good for a Christian to worship Christ just as it is good for a Muslim to worship Allah just as it is good for a Buddhist to worship consciousness. The post-modern micronarrative allows for the vicarious attribution of one to the other. Because the POMO sees faith as a universal (that it is inherently human to worship something), he sees faithlessness as an atrocity though he will not impose his content upon another. That is why the POMO says that it does not matter what you believe in but that you must believe in something. You must believe in something. That is why the POMO emphasizes that each individual must be true to himself, so the content varies from person to person but faith is there all the same. That is why a POMO can be friends with people of other cultures, religions, and backgrounds (that to the Modern seems incompatible) and not have a problem at all. He does not look through a metanarrative expecting the replication of the same content. He looks from one micronarrative to another micronarrative to yet another micronarrative expecting the generous correlation of contentless similarity: a generous ambiguity.
The metanarrative storyline has been the dominant, interpretive methodology of Modern culture. The metanarrative converges the "little" histories into an overarching history so that the "little" histories are subject to the interpretive structure of the overarching drama. The "nationalist" story form is a metanarrative: the "story" of the nation provides the lens through which ancillary stories (the stories of the "other" nations) are contextualized. The Christian metanarrative is a salvation-based plot of creation-fall-redemption (or some similar version). For example, within this overarching framework the English primarily founded America to be a "city on a hill" for all other nations to follow as well as the African-American primarily being brought to America to "hear the Gospel and be saved."
Similarly, this structure is replicated in most relational structures, too, so that marriage is a "sanctifying" ordinance and children are to be "blessed" if they endorse parental values. In this view the government's basic function is to punish the "bad" and to reward the "good", therefore, perpetuating justice (the righting of wrong). Even in the church, "discipleship" emphasizes salvific replication until the "earth is full of the glory of the Lord like the waters cover the sea." Another way to say it is that the metanarrative determines the history, the story.
The metanarrative is not an invalid way of looking at history. It is, however, not only invalid but dangerous when viewed as the absolutely only perspective. To do this is to equate this "one" narrative to the "deductive" perspective of God. Such is the replication of Platonic or gnostic heresy where one finite perspective is elevated above others, rendering the others not only susbtantially inferior but morally inferior (aka, ungodly). A singularly strict interpretation of the metanarrative exacerbates the POMO's panic over determinism, namely genetic inheritance. It is a trait of the POMO to pierce, tatt, and otherwise alter himself. The POMO reads a suffocating determinism into an absolute metanarrative interpretation of history. Simply put, the POMO tries to transcend the "story" given him by his Modern ancestor by "marking" himself in a way that genetic inheritance or DNA cannot replicate. Look at the Goth who paints his face a deathly pallor or the crumper who masks himself with clown paint or the increase in symbolic tatts or piercings in significant places like the eyebrow, lip, tongue, nipple, navel, etc. Understand that these are all forms of circumcision, and circumcision was originally introduced as an imposition upon the human body that transcends genetic inheritance. The symbolic alteration of his body is one way that the POMO distinguishes himself from his Modern parent. For the POMO it is freedom. It is a new beginning. He is creating a new person, a new people, a new story.
So the POMO rejects the metanarrative or is fine with the metanarrative so long as it is accompanied by the interpretation of several "micronarratives", lessening the absolutist implication of the metanarrative. The POMO arrives at truth by the correlation of micronarratives (personalized stories); so the POMO will generalize the similar ideas common to each micronarrative. For example, the POMO will look at the creation narratives of several people-groups and conclude that all people-groups have a creation narrative or story that embodies their own particular primordial values. Or they will look at the religions of various people groups and ascertain that Jesus is to Allah what Allah is to Eastern consciousness and so on. The POMO then concludes that 1) the tendency in every people group is to deify a personality, and that 2) the desire to worship a deity is inherently human.
Notice how in this micronarrative the content is important to the specific people-groups, but not necessarily important to the whole (global). In other words, the micronarrative says that it is good for a Christian to worship Christ just as it is good for a Muslim to worship Allah just as it is good for a Buddhist to worship consciousness. The post-modern micronarrative allows for the vicarious attribution of one to the other. Because the POMO sees faith as a universal (that it is inherently human to worship something), he sees faithlessness as an atrocity though he will not impose his content upon another. That is why the POMO says that it does not matter what you believe in but that you must believe in something. You must believe in something. That is why the POMO emphasizes that each individual must be true to himself, so the content varies from person to person but faith is there all the same. That is why a POMO can be friends with people of other cultures, religions, and backgrounds (that to the Modern seems incompatible) and not have a problem at all. He does not look through a metanarrative expecting the replication of the same content. He looks from one micronarrative to another micronarrative to yet another micronarrative expecting the generous correlation of contentless similarity: a generous ambiguity.
