Analogy and (White) Feminist Theory: Thinking Race and the Color of the Cyborg Body
by
Malini Johar Schueller
Analogy and (White) Feminist Theory presents an effective overview to introduce the topic of the cyborg as an image of progress, and the consequential impact of the representation of race. Although it does not focus heavily on different forms of popular culture as the other online sources cited do, it introduces the relationship that women of colour and white women have with the myth of the cyborg. By doing so, it offers explanations into how we have come to generate particular stereotypes and theories within the broader community. As Schueller highlights, women of colour “theorize about a particular group of women, many white feminists continue to theorize about gender/sexuality/women in general.” By failing to address that certain groups of woman have been marginalised throughout history, it has been pointed out by African American feminists that white women have “allied themselves with a racist patricidal order.” Their ignorance to address particular minority groups within the feminist movement is suggested to have infantilized them in the same way that colonial power from white men has reduced the image of the African Americans. Within this essay, Schueller calls upon the critical theories of Gayle Rubin. A crucial point raised by Rubin is that, “it is impossible to think with any clarity about the politics of race and gender as long as these are thought of as biological entities rather than as social constructs.” I think this point is the main reason why, cyborg or no cyborg image of progress, society fails to move past the issues of racism. Without acknowledging that we are responsible for the representations of race, there is very little room for change. A lovely example of this inability for transformation is raised within this article. As I’m sure many have witnessed, the word race (usually alluding to “African American, Latina, Native American, and Asian” etc.) is often enveloped by commas. This image of the word seen as: “race,” according to Schueller, “simply repeats white privilege by assuming that whiteness need not be named” with race only referring to “people of colour”. The presence of racism within our written language is a disturbing illustration of how far we engage in racism within everyday life.
by
Anneke Smelik
The Carousel of Genders explores how we have become the cyborg, not by extensions from our interactions, but through changes in physical appearance. The essay explores the concept of race within popular culture by focusing on its impact or presence amongst musical ‘stars.’ Through the example of Michael Jackson, a perfect display of hybrid figure, Smelik discusses society’s perception of race. Although as a community, the cyborg has become the image of progress, with physical alterations and artificial bodies considered acceptable, it appears as a wider audience that racism has not progressed or diminished; a concept which Michael Jackson so fiercely fought to change. By shaping the “mutation of his body and face in his own image,” Jackson “does not wear a mask, but is a mask”. Our preoccupation with the way Jackson has constructed his body mirrors our preoccupation with race and gender. As Smelik addresses, his face, “functions as a masquerade…onto which a culture projects” these concerns. In doing so, Jackson undermines the stereotype of what it means to be a black male. It is through the examples of other people that we are confronted with our inability to progress past race. In this case, the idolised figure of Michael Jackson teaches us that there can be such a thing as a ‘third race,’ with black and white combining. For Jackson, this image becomes the perfect utopia.
Interracial Joysticks: Pornography’s Web of Racist Attractions
by
Daniel Bernardi
In Interracial Joysticks, Daniel Bernardi analyses the somewhat taboo popular culture that is online pornography. As cyborg figures, receiving pleasure is no longer simply within the act of human to human, or skin to skin interaction. It has now progressed to the screen. Although this means of stimulation is an evolution from the past, with people seeking thrill and pleasure from the digital world, Bernardi explains that the representation of race within online pornography has not revolutionised. Bernardi reveals, “pornography today is very much about yesterday’s ideology of hate,” with all porn leading to “the white male at the joystick of pleasure.” His conclusion that race within these sites is sold as an ‘object’ of ‘fetishization’ and punishment, is simply a way of marketing a representation and story of “freaks” (or multicultural people) for the service of “white fear and fantasy, pain and pleasure, hate and lust.” This revelation of the exploitation of race and multiculturalism for the benefit of the white man connects strongly with Malini Johar Schueller’s concept of colonial power being fuelled by the white man. Bernardi addresses the presence of racism, and the lack of advancement in rejecting these common stereotypes by acknowledging the inability of people to see ‘whiteness.’ This essay stresses that to make ‘whiteness’ visible is the “real challenge in the new cultural politics.”
Online Racial Discrimination Linked to Depression, Anxiety in Teens
from
Science Daily
As this site addresses, it was first predicted by many scholars that the Internet would be a medium of lessening racism and race-based discrimination due to the anonymity of online interaction. With social networking becoming one of the most significant ways adolescents communicate and interact, this article addresses one of the most current and crucial outcomes of the progressive cyborg figure. Referencing a professor of Educational Psychology and African American studies at the University of Illinois, Brendesha Tynes, Online Racial Discrimination Linked to Depression, Anxiety in Teens, addresses that publicity is often allocated to cyber-bullying, but more attention needs to be paid to the effects of racial discrimination on the emotional well-being of adolescents. According to Tynes, people of colour often experience racial discrimination in both face-to-face settings and online. For her study, it was important to see the varying impacts of experiencing racial abuse in both online and offline settings. Another frightening aspect of the internet that this site addresses is the emergence of ‘hate websites.’ In a clear display that the progress seen within the image of the cyborg figure cannot be applied to all issues of gender and race, these disturbing websites are designed to recruit new members, often targeting children. One example of this is the ‘White Pride for Kids’ which encourages children to join through persuasive language, cleverly masking racist ideologies. As Tynes highlights, a great concern with children having such free reign on the internet is that many of these sites “function as an echo chamber of false information.”
Queer Cyborgs and New Mutants:
Race, Sexuality, and Prosthetic Sociality in Digital Space
by
Mimi Nguyen
It is suggested in Nguyen’s article that “the mutant body and the cyborg body act as metaphors, representations of social structures and cultural systems.” Through her study of the cyborg, Mimi Nguyen discusses her involvement with video games and the virtual world, and the roles that gender and race play amongst them. Unlike the majority of the texts explored within this webliography, the writer makes a strong and personal connection to the subject of the piece. Often she compares the longing she experienced as an adolescent to connect to a character introduced in 1980 by Marvel Universe. The incarnated character, Karma, once a young Vietnamese refugee named Xi’an Coy Manh, is recruited by a Professor of a New England school for ‘Gifted Youngsters’. This comes as a result of the character’s genetic code being altered due to her mother’s exposure to mutagenic chemical defoliants used during the war. For Mimi Nguyen, being part Vietnamese, this new multicultural team of Superheros named ‘The New Mutants’ was a reassuring development, encouraging her to want to live the life of Karma. As this move by the Marvel Universe can be looked at as a positive and progressive move in the social construct of race, we must also analyse the representation of such a group. According to Nguyen, the team is a group of multicultural “misfits.” By labelling such a group as ‘mutants,’ it could be argued that this virtual world symbolises a larger concern: that society is unable to accept multiculturalism as normal, such as the way we view ‘whiteness.’ However, perhaps the fact that we are all mutants in some way (according to the idea of the cyborg) indicates that no further discrimination occurs within the creation of this team of superheros. This argument seems to come to a subjective and personal view.
Madeleine Williams Women Studies: SELF.NET September 2010
Critical Annotated Webliography 20518785
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