Title  'Cyberpunk and the Body as Project'.

Speaker: Gul Dag, PhD candidate in English Literature, University of Hull.

Abstract:

Cyberpunk juxtaposes the various cultural and technological revolutions of the 1980s with what it sees as the unavoidable collapse of western civilisation: presenting the reader with a detached assessment of the penalties of placing uncontainable technology in the hands of ungovernable mega corporations. It is a genre of science fiction that was first developed in the 1980s by writers focusing on artificial intelligence and hacker culture in often post-industrial, consumerist landscapes, and its depiction of the invasive and often insidious nature of technology, biotechnology and cybernetics allows for a critique of the ways in which such advancements are developed, utilised, and controlled. 

This talk focuses upon the selected works of three prominent authors: William Gibson, Rudy Rucker and George Alec Effinger, and considers the ways in which the body as project is depicted in their works. The perspectives offered by these writers in relation to corporeal and psychological fracture and ‘restoration’ exemplify one of the elemental concerns of the genre of Cyberpunk: the extent to which the boundary between the human and the machine can become distorted through the use of technology. This talk considers the depiction of (bio)technological advancements in these novels, with a critique of the extent to which such developments can result in their subjects becoming at once regarded as both more and less than human.    

Link to Gul's academic profile: http://hull.academia.edu/GulDag

Cost: Free Admission – All welcome but booking is required in order to guarantee a place and to enable us to ensure we have an adequately sized room booked for the session. 

Enquiries:  Jackie McAndrew - Monday to Weds - OpenCampus work days. 

Email: opencampus@hull.ac.uk

Telephone: 01482 466585

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