proposed course syllabus
3rd year sociology & anthropology
© anne galloway 2003
this work is governed under a creative commons license

course themes

virtual bodies

what are virtual bodies? how are they different from actual bodies? what are the differences between humans and machines? what is a disembodied mind? do cyborgs feel pain? can you rape someone in cyberspace? who owns our genetic information? how are our bodies mediated by technology?

Mini-Lecture Bibliography:

Balsamo, Anne. 2000. The Virtual Body in Cyberspace. In D. Bell and B. Kennedy (eds.) The Cybercultures Reader, pp. 489-503. London: Routledge.

Critical Art Ensemble. 1997. Flesh Machine: Cyborgs, Designer Babies & The New Eugenic Consciousness. New York: Autonomedia. (online)

Critical Art Ensemble. 2002. Molecular Invasion. New York: Autonomedia. (online)

Hayles, N. Katherine. 1999. How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Lupton, Deborah. 2000. The Embodied Computer/User. In D. Bell and B. Kennedy (eds.) The Cybercultures Reader, pp. 477-487. London: Routledge.

Stone, Alluquere Rosanne. 2000. Will the Real Body Please Stand Up? Boundary Stories About Virtual Cultures. In D. Bell and B. Kennedy (eds.) The Cybercultures Reader, pp. 504-528. London: Routledge.

Wood, John (ed.). 1998. Virtual Embodied: Practices/Presence/Technologies. London: Routledge.

+ additional sources

Required Readings for Students:

Greg Egan, Permutation City
Steven Levy, The Strong Claim
Hans Moravec, The Senses Have No Future
Sherry Turkle, Constructions and Reconstructions of the Self in Virtual Reality

Mark Dery, Robocopulation: Sex Times Technology Equals the Future
Karen Franck, When I Enter Virtual Reality, What Body Will I Leave Behind?
Kevin Kelly, An Open Universe
Stelarc, Towards the Post-Human

All readings are in the required text, Cyber_Reader, unless marked by an asterix (*)