Technoculture (Cultural Politics)

By Constance Penley

Book Overview

Wary, on the one hand, of the disempowering habit of viewing technology as a satanic mill of domination, and weary, on the other, of postmodernist celebrations of the technologically sublime, Constance Penley and Andrew Ross have compiled a group of provocative case studies by contributors whose critical knowledge provides a realistic assessment of the politics currently at stake in those cultural practices touched by advanced technology. The groups examined here range from high-tech office workers, "Star Trek" fans, and Japanese technoporn producers, to teenage hackers, AIDS activists, rap groups, and rock stars. Each has something to tell us about both the production and the management of repressive technocultures and about the politics of creative appropriation. But above all, "Technoculture" suggests some new and timely possibilities for the encouragement of technoliteracy - a crucial requirement not just for postmodern survival but also for the decolonization, demonopolization and democratization of social communication. Constance Penley teaches English and Film Studies at the University of Rochester. Andrew Ross teaches English at Princeton University.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0816619328
• ISBN13: 9780816619320
• Release Date: May 1991
• Publisher: University of Minnesota Press
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.4" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Uneven but worth reading

Like all anthologies, this book suffers from uneven quality. One or two essays are mediocre at best, one or two are great, and the rest fall somewhere in between. I find Haraway unreadable, the ultimate in academic hype (write enough gibberish and people will think you're a genius), and the interview with her isn't much better, but fortunately she isn't the whole book. Hartouni's thoughts on reproductive discourse are worth reading, and Penley's piece is great -- it revealed a really nifty subculture I'd never realized existed in addition to clarifying just what it was about Mr. Spock that made him so desirable to men and women alike. Overall,I thought this was a fun book to read, although I don't think it'll ever achieve classic status.

A classic on technoculture!?

Collected under the theme of technoculture Constance Penley and Andrew Ross have collected various case studies circulating around the promises and threats, facts and fictions of contemporary technological culture. This book is, of course, a classic for fans of Donna Haraway since it contains an inteview with as well as an article ("The Actors Are Cyborg, Nature Is Coyote, and the Geography Is Elsewhere") by the famous author of "A Cyborg Manifesto"(1985/1991, see also Haraway 1997). Constance Penley has also throughout the 90s written extensivly in the heterogenous field of feminist cultural studies (of science and technology). Don't miss out on these tips!