Am I a Cyborg? Honestly, I cannot claim the symbolic image of a Cyborg as an adequate representation of myself. Most of my life is spent offline and away from technology, sure I use it, but it is no part of me or my identity. In the end, it all comes off, and we have to have a shower sometime. I do agree that we construct and project our identities, whatever they may be, and we use technology, but to use the Cyborg beyond the symbolic and fantastical is like watching an episode of The Jetsons; in twenty years time, will they think of us as naïve and so preciously innocent? The tool, the technology, is an object grasped and utilised by the human- it is still separate from the human. Technology is another act of perfomance, a dress up, that does not necessarily present a real individual- what ever that is.
What I really enjoyed about this unit was an alternative and more contemporary perspective of Feminist theory. I am a Feminist and I love it, so to learn of these new and exciting ideas and theories, and more technological based, is a real treat. Even more so, as I have been taking the history unit, Medieval and Early Modern Women, comparing the contemporary digital age to that of two-hundred to nine-hundred years ago was academically challenging and brilliant, as you get a little glimpse of what continues and what changes- and really, some things never do! The technological change and spread of information caused by new developments in printing, and thus education and learning, mirrors that of the internet. The fascination with how gender and sex are influenced by this revolution is just as strong in these periods. And employment, the same week we covered employment and the influence of technology, I looked at early-modern women and work. The change in technology, and the new processes, altered their lives in many similar ways. Work was in the house, and work was gendered, and still is gendered along with technology.
What I really enjoyed about this unit was an alternative and more contemporary perspective of Feminist theory. I am a Feminist and I love it, so to learn of these new and exciting ideas and theories, and more technological based, is a real treat. Even more so, as I have been taking the history unit, Medieval and Early Modern Women, comparing the contemporary digital age to that of two-hundred to nine-hundred years ago was academically challenging and brilliant, as you get a little glimpse of what continues and what changes- and really, some things never do! The technological change and spread of information caused by new developments in printing, and thus education and learning, mirrors that of the internet. The fascination with how gender and sex are influenced by this revolution is just as strong in these periods. And employment, the same week we covered employment and the influence of technology, I looked at early-modern women and work. The change in technology, and the new processes, altered their lives in many similar ways. Work was in the house, and work was gendered, and still is gendered along with technology.
The collapse of the distinction between what is private and what is public also reflects our ancestor’s lives five-hundred years ago. There is no real distinction, just as there is no distinction between what is natural and what is artificial. The home is, and was, a porous structure that lets in public voices and influences that affect the private and individual self. The internet and new technologies are just embodiments of that.
My discomfort within a group exists on the internet- the words I type are equally prone to consorship as the words I speak. Our technology is subject to how we percieve it, and the human is always present. It is dependant upon us, it cannot exist if we do not exist.
Thank you for the great unit.
No comments:
Post a Comment