Item Details

title

POSTHUMAN REPRESENTATIONS IN CYBERPUNK FILMS

author

Yang, Menghan

abstract

The transition from humanism to posthumanism is ongoing if it has not entered the latter status entirely. Posthumanism, which features the blurring boundary driven by technology between the organic and the inorganic, human and the non-human, subject and object, is not an exotic concept that has nothing to do with everyday life; rather, it has permeated our reality both physically and philosophically, deserving attention and discussion. The cyberpunk genre is a rich soil of posthuman representations, namely cyborgs, since it is not mere fiction, but also a bridge that connects fantasy and social reality. This thesis applies textual analysis on three cyberpunk films, Blade Runner, Blade Runner 2049, and Alita: Battle Angel to explore the relationships between human and cyborgs as well as their perspectives on each other under capitalist system. A Marxist framework is utilized to critique how capitalism alienates and suppresses humanity by resorting to technology.

subject

Capitalism

Cyberpunk

Cyborg

Human-machine relationship

Posthumanism

contributor

Hood, Woodrow B. (committee chair)

Hood, Woodrow B. (committee member)

Von Burg, Ronald (committee member)

Hazen, Michael (committee member)

date

2022-05-24T08:36:10Z (accessioned)

2022-05-24T08:36:10Z (available)

2022 (issued)

degree

Communication (discipline)

identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/100765 (uri)

language

en (iso)

publisher

Wake Forest University

type

Thesis