Cyborg Fictions: The Cultural Logic of Posthumanism

Abstract

The fin-de-siecle crisis in socialism has coincided with the reappearance of the cyborg. Cyborgs are everywhere, in films, fiction, politics and theory. Three strands of cyborg discourse can be identified. First, there is the use of the cyborg to represent the increasingly complex relationship between humanity and technology. Implants, transplants, prostheses, hormonal treatment, cosmetic surgery and genetic engineering all blur the boundary between body and machine. Second, there are cyborg fictions: the narratives that explore the imaginative possibilities inspired by new technology. These include the cyberpunk fiction of William Gibson and films like Terminator and Terminator II. Thirdly, there are the theoretical extrapolations of these fictions which map the relationship between the inhuman, global systems of the new world (dis)order and the kinds of hybrid identities that are one of its characteristics. Here the most influential writer is Donna Haraway, who sparked many of the critical debates with her article, 'A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology and Socialist Feminism in the 80s', first published in Socialist Review.