Visions of the Human in Science Fiction and Cyberpunk PDF Download

Author:
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 1904710166
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
This collection of papers joins a growing body of work addressing what are arguably some of the most important questions faced in the 21st century; what does it mean to be human and what do we understand by humanity?

Author: Sabine Heuser
Publisher: Rodopi
ISBN: 9789042009868
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
This book examines the interrelationship between telecommunications and tourism in shaping the nature of space, place and the urban at the end of the twentieth century. They discuss how these agents are instrumental in the production of homogenous world-spaces, and how htese, in turn, presuppose new kinds of political and cultural identity.Virtual Geographies explores how new communication technologies are being used to produce new geographies and new types of space. Leading contributors from a wide range of disciplines including geography, sociology, philosophy and literatur.

Author: Daniel Dinello
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292758464
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 342

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Book Description
Techno-heaven or techno-hell? If you believe many scientists working in the emerging fields of twenty-first-century technology, the future is blissfully bright. Initially, human bodies will be perfected through genetic manipulation and the fusion of human and machine; later, human beings will completely shed the shackles of pain, disease, and even death, as human minds are downloaded into death-free robots whereby they can live forever in a heavenly "posthuman" existence. In this techno-utopian future, humanity will be saved by the godlike power of technology. If you believe the authors of science fiction, however, posthuman evolution marks the beginning of the end of human freedom, values, and identity. Our dark future will be dominated by mad scientists, rampaging robots, killer clones, and uncontrollable viruses. In this timely new book, Daniel Dinello examines "the dramatic conflict between the techno-utopia promised by real-world scientists and the techno-dystopia predicted by science fiction." Organized into chapters devoted to robotics, bionics, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and other significant scientific advancements, this book summarizes the current state of each technology, while presenting corresponding reactions in science fiction. Dinello draws on a rich range of material, including films, television, books, and computer games, and argues that science fiction functions as a valuable corrective to technological domination, countering techno-hype and reflecting the "weaponized, religiously rationalized, profit-fueled" motives of such science. By imaging a disastrous future of posthuman techno-totalitarianism, science fiction encourages us to construct ways to contain new technology, and asks its audience perhaps the most important question of the twenty-first century: is technology out of control?

Author: Dani Cavallaro
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1847140351
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
Cyberpunk and Cyberculture explores the work of a wide range of writers- Acker, Cadigan, Rucker, Shierley, Sterling, Williams and, of course, Gibson - setting their work in the context of science fiction, other literary genres, genre cinema - from Metropolis to Terminator to The Matrix - and contemporary work on the culture of technology.

Author: W. A. Senior
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 9

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Book Description
Cyberpunk literature examines the meaning of 'humanity' and the desperate need to survive in worlds populated by both humans and androids. Ridley Scott's film Blade Runner is discussed in terms of cyberpunk literature and its themes are compared to William Gibson's novel Neuromancer and Bruce Sterling's Artifical Kid. These themes are reflected in the visual look of the film and its exploration of the role of memory in establishing 'human-ness'. In a character analysis, the humanity of Deckard and the replicants is contrasted with the unemotional humans Bryant and Tyrell.

Author: Nader Elhefnawy
Publisher: Nader Elhefnawy
ISBN:
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
Where writing on science fiction is concerned, it is the most recent decades that most often get overlooked, so that "big picture" views of the period are a rarity. CYBERPUNK, STEAMPUNK AND WIZARDRY seeks to correct that, offering an overview of the genre that emphasizes exactly these years, with an eye to the big trends and what they meant, both for science fiction, and today's culture as a whole.

Author: Larry McCaffery
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822311683
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 410

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Book Description
The term "cyberpunk" entered the literary landscape in 1984 to describe William Gibson's pathbreaking novel Neuromancer. Cyberpunks are now among the shock troops of postmodernism, Larry McCaffery argues in Storming the Reality Studio, marshalling the resources of a fragmentary culture to create a startling new form. Artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, multinational machinations, frenetic bursts of prose, collisions of style, celebrations of texture: although emerging largely from science fiction, these features of cyberpunk writing are, as this volume makes clear, integrally related to the aims and innovations of the literary avant-garde. By bringing together original fiction by well-known contemporary writers (William Burroughs, Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, Kathy Acker, J. G. Ballard, Samuel R. Delany), critical commentary by some of the major theorists of postmodern art and culture (Jacques Derrida, Fredric Jameson, Timothy Leary, Jean-François Lyotard), and work by major practitioners of cyberpunk (William Gibson, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley, Pat Cadigan, Bruce Sterling), Storming the Reality Studio reveals a fascinating ongoing dialog in contemporary culture. What emerges most strikingly from the colloquy is a shared preoccupation with the force of technology in shaping modern life. It is precisely this concern, according to McCaffery, that has put science fiction, typically the province of technological art, at the forefront of creative explorations of our unique age. A rich opporunity for reading across genres, this anthology offers a new perspective on the evolution of postmodern culture and ultimately shows how deeply technological developments have influenced our vision and our art. Selected Fiction contributors: Kathy Acker, J. G. Ballard, William S. Burroughs, Pat Cadigan, Samuel R. Delany, Don DeLillo, William Gibson, Harold Jaffe, Richard Kadrey, Marc Laidlaw, Mark Leyner, Joseph McElroy, Misha, Ted Mooney, Thomas Pynchon, Rudy Rucker, Lucius Shepard, Lewis Shiner, John Shirley, Bruce Sterling, William Vollman Selected Non-Fiction contributors: Jean Baudrillard, Jacques Derrida, Joan Gordon, Veronica Hollinger, Fredric Jameson, Arthur Kroker and David Cook, Timothy Leary, Jean-François Lyotard, Larry McCaffery, Brian McHale, Dave Porush, Bruce Sterling, Darko Suvin, Takayuki Tatsumi

Author: Sharon O'Toole
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Cybernetics in literature
Languages : en
Pages : 450

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Book Description

Author: Karen Haber
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312313593
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 276

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Book Description
A collection of essays written by today's top science fiction authors on the Matrix, cyberpunk and the future.

Author: Sherryl Vint
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 0802090524
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
Bodies of Tomorrow argues for the importance of challenging visions of humanity in the future that overlook our responsibility as embodied beings connected to a material world.