cyborgs

fdm 20c introduction to digital media lecture 01.05.2003

warren sack / film & digital media department / university of california, santa cruz

last time who is marshall mcluhan?

the video mcluhan v 1 (1958-1964)

theses of mcluhan
hot and cool media media as extensions of man the ratio of the senses the medium is the message

outline midterm teaching evaluation description of the midterm examination a definition of media studies
digital media studies

what is a cyborg?
a comparison of identity and cyborg politics

who is donna haraway? a video: haraway on paper tiger television a reading of the cyborg manifesto

midterm teaching evaluation please respond to the 25 questions and return the completed forms to nathan or lindsay today, in class

description of the midterm examination rough drafts of 12 possible midterm questions can be found here:
http://artstream.ucsc.edu/film20c/Midterm/possible-midterm-questions.rtf

all of the lecture slides can be found online indexed off of the course schedule:
http://artstream.ucsc.edu/film20c/schedule.html

a definition of media studies media studies is the theory and practice of exploring how people and things are connected, reflected, extended, reconfigured, and separated by technologies and techniques
media as mirrors media as prostheses media as machinations

digital media studies is a kind of media studies that pays especial attention to the techniques and technologies of computers and computer networks

mediation: how are we connected/separated? hypertexts networks/rhizomes documentary method identification prostheses/extensions haraways proposals
human-animal machine-organism
physical-non-physical (e.g., molecular-scale machines of electromagnetism and light)

background: questions of identity gender: who is a woman? who is a man? race: who is black? who is white? sexuality: who is straight? who is gay? class: who is rich? who is poor?

the problems of dichotomies (i.e., the problems of opposites)

what happens to identity and politics if we fit into multiple categories or we do not feel comfortable in any category?

questions about identity politics do these exclusive categories define ones identity? do these categories constitute political groups?
e.g., what happens to these divisions when all of the categories are invoked at once? (e.g., for the purposes of feminism is one always first, primarily defined by gender and only secondarily defined by race and class, or is the order inverted?

non-essentialist alternatives to identity non-essentialist: definition by negation rather than separation according to essential criteria examples:
queer (e.g., not straight) women of color (a la chela sandoval; e.g., not white and not male)

biopolitics: biology as connection biopolitics is a term coined by the philosopher michel foucault
who is carbon-based? who is silicon-based? who breathes oxygen? who breathes carbondioxide? who reproduces sexually? who reproduces asexually?

does this escape the problems of dichotomies?

what is this?

chimera: identities of mixtures & fusions definition of chimera (Oxford English Dictionary)
Mythology: A fabled fire-breathing monster of Greek mythology, with a lion's head, a goat's body, and a serpent's tail (or according to others with the heads of a lion, a goat, and a serpent), killed by Bellerophon. Painting, Archicture: A grotesque monster, formed of the parts of various animals. Literature: An unreal creature of the imagination Biology: [ad. G. chimre (H. Winkler 1907, in Ber. d. Deut. Bot. Ges. XXV. 574).] An organism (commonly a plant) in which tissues of genetically different constitution co-exist as a result of grafting, mutation, or some other process.

definition of cyborg A cyborg is a cybernetic organism, a hybrid machine and organism, a creature of social reality as well as a creature of fiction. ... By the late twentieth century, our time, a mythic time, we are all chimeras, theorized and fabricated hybrids of machine and organism; in short, we are cyborgs.
Haraway, p. 516

a cyborg world: from one perspective From one perspective, a cyborg world is about the final imposition of a grid of control on the planet, about the final abstraction embodied in a Star Wars apocalypse waged in the name of defence, about the final appopriation of womens bodies in a masculinist orgy of war.
Haraway, p. 519

a cyborg world: from another perspective From another perspective, a cyborg world might be about lived social and bodily realities in which people are not afraid of their joint kinship with animals and machines, not afraid of permanently partial identities and contradictory standpoints.
Haraway, p. 519

who/what is a cyborg? do you wear a prosthesis? e.g., do you wear contact lenses or eyeglasses? do you take any medications? have you ever had an immunization? do you depend upon any form of technology for transportation? how would your life be affected if the power grid was shut off permanently? do you ever eat food or drink water that has been processed? in short, how intimately tied are you to technology?

who is donna haraway? Experience

Professor of the History of Consciousness, UCSC Assistant Professor of the History of Science, Johns Hopkins University Lecturer, Women Studies and History of Science, University of Hawaii

Education
Ph.D., Biology, Yale University B.A., Zoology; B.A., Literature; B.A., Philosophy

Personal
Irish American raised Catholic four adult household

who donna haraway? My work has always been about what counts as nature. Haraway, p. 51 of How Like a Leaf Publications
Crystals, Fabrics and Fields Primate Visions Simians Cyborgs and Women Modest_Witness The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People and Significant Otherness

what is paper tiger television?

Paper Tiger Television (PTTV) is an open, non-profit, volunteer video collective. Through the production and distribution of our public access series, media literacy/video production workshops, community screenings and grassroots advocacy PTTV works to challenge and expose the corporate control of mainstream media. www.papertiger.org Since 1981, Paper Tiger Television has appeared across the country on public access cable channels; the noncommercial, uncensored channels available for public use. The series is produced by a volunteer collective of media producers, educators and activists. Low Budget TV is a correllary to the commitment that TV production should not be limited to the rich. From PPTV to the Independent Media Centers (www.indymedia.net)

video donna haraway reads national geographic

the cyborg manifesto what is a manifesto?

compare to the manifestos of art and politics (e.g., surrealism and marxism)

why was it written? DH: In 1982, the editors of the Socialist Review gave me an assignment: Write five pages on what socialist-feminist priorities are in the Reagan years. So I started writing and what came out was A Cyborg Manifesto. TNG: So your cyborgs origins are in this modest proposal? DH: Yes. I think the moral of the story is, dont give me an assignment!
p. 39, How Like a Leaf

the breakdown of three dichotomies human/animal machine/organism physical/non-physical why? cf., biology and the sciences and technologies of communication and information

the cyborg as organizing myth There is nothing about being female that naturally binds women. No objects, spaces or bodies are sacred in themselves; any component can be interfaced with any other if the proper standard, the proper code, can be constructed for processing signals in a common language. The cyborg is a kind of disassenbled and reassembled, post-modern collective and personal self. This is the self feminists must code.
Haraway, p. 519

cyborgs and networking I prefer a network ideological image, suggesting the profusion of spaces and identities and the permeability of boundaries in the perosnla body and in the body politic. Networking is both a feminist practice and a multinational corporate strategy -- weaving is for oppositional cyborgs.

regeneration not reproduction I would suggest that cyborgs have more to do with regeneration and are suspicious of the reproductive matrix and of most birthing.

next time midterm examination

see
http://artstream.ucsc.edu/film20c/Midterm/possible-midterm-questions.rtf