In 1985, Donna Haraway published a post-humanist essay titled “A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century” that challenged traditional feminist theories on science and technology. Principally, Haraway believed women were dismissing the fields of technology and science as masculine, thereby denying themselves the opportunity to advance in the field as men continued to forge ahead. Haraway’s theory was achieved through the image of the cyborg, “a cybernetic organism, a hybrid of machine and organism, a creature of social reality as well as a creature of fiction” (5). In fact, her manifesto inspired the term cyberfeminism, which is “a sporadic, tactical, contradictory set of theories, debates, and practices relating to gender and digital culture” (Milford 5).
Haraway argued against our identities because she saw “gender, race, or class consciousness as an achievement forced on us by the terrible historical experience of the contradictory social realities of patriarchy, colonialism, and capitalism” (16). Patriarchal societies have historically explained human nature to justify male domination over women. In these societies, predetermined values and behavioral patterns are strictly enforced on both sexes. Haraway claims humans and animals, machines and organisms (both animals and humans), and the physical versus the non-physical boundaries were broken throughout history and redefined the meaning of culture in society.
Haraway posited we are all cyborgs, suggesting that humans and machines have, figuratively, become fused in a “post-gender world”. According to Trevor Milford, this fusion “conflated identity and often literally in terms of shared physical space, whether via technological interaction or corporeally shared space” (8). Since cyborgs are an amalgamation of the machine and the organism, nature and culture are merged into one “body”, uniting them and dispelling the essentialist perception of human nature. Haraway deemed the cyborg would connect “feminism with technoscience [as] a way of envisioning political coalition that did not rest on an exclusivist notion of women” (Bastian 1028). Within her cyborg world, Haraway felt she could politically unite all dominations with fundamental changes, leading to “to openness and encourage pluralism and indefiniteness.”
Though Haraway’s ideology is almost forty years old, it still resonates today. As Milford explains, online and offline spaces “entrench sexism, racism, and homophobia” (Haraway 9). This is evident in the way females, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community have to cope with bias and judgement when using social media platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter). Often, these groups find they cannot be their self and have to resort to filtering their likeness to avoid harsh criticism, and even that does not always stop the unwarranted comments. These marginalized groups are also mocked when gaming. For many gamers, the compelling notion of disguising yourself within the technology repels the distressing criticism; however, it strips the gamer of their identity because they can use voice enhancers as well as different avatars to camouflage themselves. Our (Western) culture has become about likes and tearing each other down to make our perceived self seem more powerful, more in control – but none of it is real! “To imagine that we can segregate these things – virtual and real – not only misunderstands our relationship with technology, but our relationship with culture” (Milford 11). The microelectronic devices have taken control of our lives and changed our impression of one another. As Haraway describes in her essay, “miniaturization has turned out to be about power; small is not so much beautiful as preeminently dangerous” (Haraway 13).
In the forty years since Haraway penned her essay, have we learned anything about how to treat one another without decimating the identity of the other person? Have women and other marginalized groups found the same amount of respect and dominance in science and technology as men? Has our culture changed for the better with the introduction of miniature computers in everyone’s hands? The answer to all of these questions is no. We have not evolved, not since 1985, not since reality has become virtual and people stopped caring about one another. Human nature is damned because we lack the empathy we once had. Will be ever revert, or will the computers take over our beings until we actually become cyborgs robotically living in a non-physical space?
Sources
- Bastian, Michelle. “Haraway’s Lost Cyborg and the Possibilities of Transversalism.” Signs, vol. 31, no. 4, 2006, pp. 1027–49. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.1086/500597. Accessed 27 July 2023.
- Haraway, Donna. “A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century.” University of Minnesota Press, 2016. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/warw/detail.action?docID=4392065.
- Milford, Trevor Scott. “Revisiting Cyberfeminism: Theory as a Tool for Understanding Young Women’s Experiences.” In eGirls, eCitizens. Chapter 2. Edited by Jane Barley and Valerie Steeves. University of Ottawa Press, 2015.
Hello Kim! Your analysis of Donna Haraway’s “A Cyborg Manifesto” resonates deeply in today’s context, highlighting the persistent challenge she posed to traditional feminist theories in science and technology almost four decades ago. Haraway’s compelling argument about the need for women to engage in technology and science instead of perceiving them as masculine remains an unmet call, even in the contemporary world. The concept of the cyborg, blurring the lines between machine and organism, echoes a vision of a post-gender world, where the fusion of nature, culture, and technology redefines societal boundaries. Your observation of the continued bias and judgment faced by marginalized groups, especially in online spaces like social media and gaming platforms, underscores the ongoing challenges despite technological progress. Haraway’s insights from the past seem eerily relevant, indicating a lack of progress in how we treat each other, suggesting that despite technological advancements, empathy and respect in societal interactions have regressed.The unresolved issues raised by Haraway’s essay persist, questioning the true evolution in our treatment of others, particularly in science, technology, and social interactions in today’s digital world. Great post! I loved this topic!
Hi Kim!
I enjoyed reading your post. I particularly like your discussion about Milford’s offline/online concept applied to video games. The compellation to disguise oneself to prevent harassment feels true, especially in voice chat. It’s my least favorite part of gaming but also one of the most important features to help achieve objectives in multiplayer games. I only speak when needed or spoken to for the most part in VC. In a blog post from two weeks ago, I discussed how game rules could affect player conduct (primarily employing Ian Bogst’s concept of procedurality). While I think bullying in MMO culture plays a huge role, I also wonder how the contexts of different gaming environments affect behavior. People who react harshly to “bad players” can be so immersed in the game that they forget basic respect and take advantage of anonymity (which is not an excuse) or are entrenched in a struggle to achieve a sense of prestige from achievements. In this case, the prestige can triumph over the in-game achievements. With all this in mind, how can games change to decrease bullying? Or does such an idea threaten developers because they fear a large sector of their audience would not enjoy the game otherwise? Thanks for making me think about this, Kim! Great post!
Hi Kim, this is a fine summary of
‘The Cyborg Manifesto” and Haraway’s ideas in it, put very nicely into context of the current times. As for your final question, I’m not sure what we as a society have learned since then or from her but we have surely seen evidence of the idea that miniaturization is powerful and can be deadly. Perhaps we’ve also learned that it can simultaneously be deadly, beautiful, powerful, and at times beneficial (for example through medical uses, with medical nanotechnology being a graphic example of how it can be all these things simultaneously). It is now a commonplace that women and even children’s labor has been used to create some of this tiny technology that is so powerful. See https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jan/03/child-labour-toxic-leaks-the-price-we-could-pay-for-a-greener-future:
“Metals such as lithium and cobalt provide examples of the awkward issues that lie ahead, said Herrington. Both elements are needed to make lightweight rechargeable batteries for electric cars and for storing power from wind and solar plants. Their production is likely to increase significantly over the next decade – and that could cause serious ecological problems.
In the case of cobalt, 60% of the world’s supply comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo where large numbers of unregulated mines use children as young as seven as miners. There they breathe in cobalt-laden dust that can cause fatal lung ailments while working tunnels that are liable to collapse.”
From the standpoint of “small technology” playing a role in social divisions, that is a little more complicated but it is very sad that the merging of the human and the machine often leads to humans becoming more divided and in some cases more likely to resurrect old ideas about what is “nature” and “unnatural,” even when it comes to gender roles.