Modernism and Totality

Abstract

This article surveys the transformations and permutations of “totality” throughout the cultural and political landscapes of the twentieth century. Specifically, it explores connections between “high’ modernism” and totality by focusing on the heritage of this pairing as figured by major thinkers from both the Frankfurt school and structuralist and poststructuralist debates in France. Ultimately, I argue that modernism is an unfinishable archive, one that resists, and will never become, a closed totality.