{"title":"“I try to tell myself that it’s a machine, but it doesn’t help”","authors":"Johan Hallqvist","doi":"10.3384/cu.1330","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The Swedish sci-fi drama TV series Real Humans (original title in Swedish: Äkta människor) can be viewed as a playground for trying out imagined possible future human-robot relationships that can tell us something regarding ideas about possible futures for being human. In the paper, representations of ttranshumansexual relationships are explored, specifically how these representations reproduce and possibly challenge notions of being human. Three articulations of transhumansexual relationships are identified: authenticity, legal subjectivity, and failure of heterosexuality. The negotiations of being human take place in three different discourses – a heteronormative and humanonormative discourse on gender and sexuality, a biological discourse, and a citizenship discourse. Transhumansexuals and hubots in transhumansexual relationships are humanized – anthropomorphized – and made more intelligible as human(-like) beings. However, the quest to make transhumansexual relationships intelligible as something human tends to (hetero- and humano-)normalize the queer potential of transhumansexual relationships\n \n ","PeriodicalId":52133,"journal":{"name":"Culture Unbound","volume":"12 4","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2022-02-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Culture Unbound","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.3384/cu.1330","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"Social Sciences","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The Swedish sci-fi drama TV series Real Humans (original title in Swedish: Äkta människor) can be viewed as a playground for trying out imagined possible future human-robot relationships that can tell us something regarding ideas about possible futures for being human. In the paper, representations of ttranshumansexual relationships are explored, specifically how these representations reproduce and possibly challenge notions of being human. Three articulations of transhumansexual relationships are identified: authenticity, legal subjectivity, and failure of heterosexuality. The negotiations of being human take place in three different discourses – a heteronormative and humanonormative discourse on gender and sexuality, a biological discourse, and a citizenship discourse. Transhumansexuals and hubots in transhumansexual relationships are humanized – anthropomorphized – and made more intelligible as human(-like) beings. However, the quest to make transhumansexual relationships intelligible as something human tends to (hetero- and humano-)normalize the queer potential of transhumansexual relationships
期刊介绍:
Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research is a journal for border-crossing cultural research, globally open to articles from all areas in this large field, including cultural studies as well as other interdisciplinary and transnational currents for exploring cultural perspectives, issues and phenomena. It is peer-reviewed and easily accessible for downloading as open access. Culture Unbound is hosted by Linköping University Electronic Press (LiU E-Press, www.ep.liu.se). It is based on a co-operation between three Linköping University units that provide a unique profile to the journal, bridging regional and global research traditions: -The Advanced Cultural Studies Institute of Sweden (ACSIS), with interdisciplinary transnational exchange. -The Department of Culture Studies (Tema Q), with interdisciplinary research and PhD education.