The Gendered Cyborg explores the relationship between representation, technoscience and gender, through the metaphor of the cyborg. The contributors argue that the figure of the cyborg offers ways of thinking about the relationship between culture and technology, people and machines which disrupt the power of science to enfore the categories through which we think about being human: male and female. Taking inspiration from Donna Haraway's groundbreaking Manifesto for Cyborgs, the articles consider how the cyborg has been used in cultural representation from reproductive technology to sci-fi, and question whether the cyborg is as powerful a symbol as is often claimed. The different sections of the reader explore: * the construction of gender categories through science * the interraction of technoscience and gender in contemporary science fiction film such as Bladerunner and the Alien series * debates around modern reproductive technology such as ultrasound scans and IVF, assessing their benefits and constraints for women * issues relating to artificial intelligence and the internet.

In particular, Donna Haraway argued in her famous 1991 'Cyborg Manifesto' that people, since they are so often now detached and separated from nature, have themselves evolved into cyborgs. This striking idea has had considerable influence within critical theory, cultural studies and even science fiction (where it has surfaced, for example, in the Terminator films and in the Borg of the Star Trek franchise). But it is a notion that has had much less currency in theology. In his innovative new book, Scott Midson boldly argues that the deeper nuances of Haraway's and the cyborg idea can similarly rejuvenate theology, mythology and anthropology. Challenging the damaging anthropocentrism directed towards nature and the non-human in our society, the author reveals - through an imaginative reading of the myth of Eden - how it is now possible for humanity to be at one with the natural world even as it vigorously pursues novel, 'post-human', technologies.

The beginning of the twenty-first century has already seen its fair share of modern myths with heroes such as Spider-Man, Superman, and Harry Potter. The authors in this volume deconstruct, discuss, engage, and interrogate the mythologies of the new millennium in science fiction fantasy texts. Using literary and rhetorical criticism - paired with philosophy, cultural studies, media arts, psychology, and communication studies - they illustrate the function, value, and role of new mythologies, and show that the universal appeal of these texts is their mythic power, drawing upon archetypes of the past which resonate with individuals and throughout culture. In this way they demonstrate how mythology is timeless and eternal.

This book examines how pacemakers and defibrillators participate in transforming life and death in high-tech societies. In both popular and medical accounts, these internal devices are often portrayed as almost magical technologies. Once implanted in bodies, they do not require any ‘user’ agency. In this unique and timely book, Nelly Oudshoorn argues that any discourse or policy assuming a passive role for people living with these implants silences the fact that keeping cyborg bodies alive involves their active engagement. Pacemakers and defibrillators not only act as potentially life-saving technologies, but simultaneously transform the fragility of bodies by introducing new vulnerabilities. Oudshoorn offers a fascinating examination of what it takes to become a resilient cyborg, and in the process develops a valuable new sociology of creating ‘resilient’ cyborgs.

In this book, Mick Howard uses a Saussurean framework to explore how bodies and technologies intermingle through a theory of cyborg semiotics. Howard argues that, like words, this combination follows rules of language and can be fruitfully analyzed through the lens of the cyborg. Just as spelling and grammar dictate which words may be formed and in which order they may be sequenced, cyborg semiotics unveils the underlying rules governing how technologies and bodies can be combined to make meaning and how these cyborgs are permitted to interact with each other. This intersectional theory, Howard posits, provides a unique perspective on power and the human condition.

Building off the highly successful The Cyborg Handbook, this new collection of essays, interviews, and creative pieces brings together a set of compelling personal accounts about what it means to live as a cyborg in the twenty-first century. Human integration with complex technologies goes back to clothes, cooking, and language, but has accelerated incredibly in the last few centuries, with interest spreading among scientists, coders, people with sophisticated implants, theorists, and artists. This collection includes some of the most articulate of these voices from over 25 countries, including Donna Haraway, Stelarc, Natasha Vita-More, Steve Mann, Amber Case, Michael Chorost, Moon Ribas, Kevin Warwick, Sandy Stone, Dion Farquhar, Angeliki Malakasioti, Elif Ayiter, Heesang Lee, Angel Gordo, and others. Addressing topics including race, gender, sexuality, class, conflict, capitalism, climate change, disability and beyond, this collection also explores the differences between robots, androids, cyborgs, hybrids, post-, trans-, and techno-humans, offering readers a critical vocabulary for understanding and discussing the cyborgification of culture and everyday life. Compelling, interdisciplinary, and international, the book is a perfect primer for students, researchers, and teachers of cyberculture, media and cultural theory, and science fiction studies, as well as anyone interested in the intersections between human and machine.

A concise introduction to cyborg theory that examines the way in which technology is situated, political, and embodied. This introduction to cyborg theory provides a critical vantage point for analyzing the claims around emerging technologies like automation, robots, and AI. Cyborg analyzes and reframes popular and scholarly conversations about cyborgs from the perspective of feminist cyborg theory. Drawing on their combined decades of training, teaching, and research in the social sciences, design, and engineering education, Laura Forlano and Danya Glabau introduce an approach called critical cyborg literacy. Critical cyborg literacy foregrounds power dynamics and pays attention to the ways that social and cultural factors such as gender, race, and disability shape how technology is imagined, developed, used, and resisted. Forlano and Glabau offer critical cyborg literacy as a way of thinking through questions about the relationship between humanity and technology in areas such as engineering and computing, art and design, and health care and medicine, as well as the social sciences and humanities. Cyborg examines whether modern technologies make us all cyborgs—if we consider, for instance, the fact that we use daily technologies at work, have technologies embedded into our bodies in health care applications, or use technology to critically explore possibilities as artists, designers, activists, and creators. Lastly, Cyborg offers perspectives from critical race, feminist, and disability thinkers to help chart a path forward for cyborg theory in the twenty-first century.