Tracciare i corpi oltre l’umano. Dal mostro di Frankenstein a noi cyborg
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.13129/2281-8138/2016.0.86-101Keywords:
body, post-human, politics, technology, imaginaryAbstract
The imaginary plays a key role in the construction and perception of our body. For this it takes a long time: so it is necessary to reconstruct genealogies that show, for exemple, how a certain modernity has already observed some conflicts on the frontiers of the human.
In the Nineteenth Century, we find two archetypal figures of bodies that are beyond the human. The creature of Dr. Victor Frankenstein was born by assembling parts of dead bodies, and taking advantage of the scientific and technological advances. Count Dracula trades with the blood of human and with the animal forms. So the Frankenstein's creature and Count Dracula have opened a reflection about the power relationships that designed their and our bodies. They show how the body is the result of an continuous crossing with the technosphere and teriosphere.
The development of computers and telematics, and on this basis the emerging of the anthropo-technologies, have open an imaginary, a conceptual horizon and various practices, that have made us able to know new figures as the cyborgs, new paradigms related to the post-human, new possibilities for action on our biological life. Today the image of the body is definitely changed from the one that the humanistic tradition has released us.
References
Abruzzese A. (1979), La grande scimmia. Mostri vampiri automi mutanti. L’immaginario collettivo dalla letteratura al cinema e all’informazione, Roma, Luca Sossella editore, ed. 2007.
Caronia A. and Gallo D. (1998), Dracula: il signore della notte nella città della luce, Alphaville. Temi e luoghi dell’immaginario di genere, I, n. 1, luglio.
Clark A. (2003), Natural-Born Cyborgs. Minds, Technologies, and the Future of Human Intelligence, Oxford – New York, Oxford UP.
Clynes M.E. and Kline N.S. (1960), Cyborgs and Space, Astronautics, n. 14: 26-27, 74-75.
Dyer-Whiteford N. (2012), Digital Labour, Species-becoming and the Global Worker, Ephemera. Theory & Politics in Organization, n. 10 (4); tr. it. 2012, Id., Il lavoro digitale, la specie umane e l’operaio globale, in F. Antonelli and B. Vecchi (ed.), Marx e la società del XXI secolo. Nuove tecnologie e capitalismo globale, Roma, Ombre Corte.
Gray C.H., Mentor S. and Figueroa-Sarriera H.J. (1995), Cyborgology. Constructing the Knowledge of Cybernetic Organisms, in C.H. Gray C.H. (ed.), The Cyborg Handbook, 1-14, New York – London, Routledge.
Haraway D.J. (1991), A Cyborg Manifesto, New York, Routledge; tr. it. 1995, Manifesto cyborg, Milano, Feltrinelli.
Henry B. (2013), Dal Golem ai cyborgs. Trasmigrazioni nell’immaginario, Livorno, Salomone Berforte & C.
Longo G.O. (2013), Paesaggi del post-umano, Atti dell’Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, tomo CLXXII: 183-196.
Lucci A. (2012), L’animale acrobatico. Origini e sviluppo del concetto di antropotecnica nel pensiero di Peter Sloterdijk, Esercizi filosofici, n. 7: 78-97.
Marchesini R. (2014), Alla fonte di Epimeteo, Aut aut, n. 361: 34-51.
Marx K. (1844), Oekonomisch-philosophische Manuskripte aus dem Jahre 1844, Paris; tr. it. 1968, Manoscritti economico-filosofici del 1844, Torino, Einaudi.
Marx K. and Engels F. (1848), Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei, London; tr. it. 1998, Manifesto del partito comunista, Milano, Rizzoli.
Meyrink G. (1915), Der Golem, Leipzig, Kurt Wolff; tr. it. Il Golem, Roma, Tre Editori, ed. 2015.
Saadawi A. (2013), Frankenstein in Baghdad; tr. it. 2015, Frankenstein a Baghdad, Roma, Edizioni E/O.
Shelley M. (1818), Frankenstein. Or The Modern Prometheus, London, Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones; tr. it. Frankenstein. Ossia il moderno Prometeo, Milano, Mondadori, ed. 1995.
Sloterdijk P. (2001), Nicht Gerettet. Versuche nach Heidegger, Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp; tr. it. 2004, Non siamo ancora stati salvati. Saggi dopo Heidegger, Milano, Bompiani.
Stoker B. (1897), Dracula, Constable, London; tr. it. Dracula, Milano, Feltrinelli, ed. 2011.
Wells H.G. (1896), The Island of dr. Moreau, London, Heinemann, Stone & Kimball; tr. it. L’isola del dottor Moreau, Milano, Mursia, ed. 1966.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
T
This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The author retains the copyright to their contribution, while allowing anyone “to reproduce, distribute, communicate to the public, publicly display, perform, execute and recite the work”, provided that the author and the title of the journal are properly acknowledged.
At the time of submitting the publication proposal, the author is also required to declare that the content and structure of the work are original and do not in any way infringe upon the rights of third parties, nor the obligations related to the protection of the moral and economic rights of other authors or rights holders, whether concerning texts, images, photographs, tables, or any other parts of which the contribution may consist.
The author further declares that they are aware of the penalties provided for under the criminal code and special laws in the event of false statements in official documents and the use of false documents. Therefore, the journal shall be exempt from any liability of any kind, whether civil, administrative, or criminal, and the author shall hold the journal harmless from any request, claim, or demand made by third parties.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).


