Another method that originated in the postmodern episteme but takes a different tack in metamodernism is pastiche. Pastiche is the juxtaposing of seemingly disparate elements, from historically separated genres and/or cultures. As one way to frame it, in the context of metamodernism, pastiche is potentially constructive, whereas under postmodernism it was dissociative. Dissociative pastiche pitted elements against each other, with results that were usually amusingly absurd, in order to call into question the unexamined premises of each. Constructive (metamodern) pastiche, on the other hand, combines disparate elements in order to build a space inhabited by a felt experience that is not at home in either element on its own. And/or maybe this: constructive pastiche allows a work of art to bring into it the kinds of cultural combinations that people experience in real life, in spite of conventional divisions between them

I use pastiche to mean artworks that combine stylistic elements from differing genres. Like, say, combining country music and hip-hop in the same song. In postmodern work, that sort of pastiche serves to poke fun at each genre, by pitting the two genres against each other. I use the term destructive pastiche for that. In metamodern / constructive pastiche, it serves to sort of create a “bigger space” where the two (or more) genres kind of lean against each other like tent poles, holding up a structure that allows a kind of feeling that wouldn’t otherwise be expressible.”