Chapter 16 Forms of Technological Embodiment

This chapter differs with others in this book radically: it is not a society-level analysis, but a feministic "body theory" study. It focuses on the transformation of the conception of the human body, rather than the significant macro issues in the "globalizing", "informational" or "network" society.

Although many pieces that we've read touched on the transformations of human lives, this is the first time in this semester that we read about things so micro and so close to our everyday lives: fashion magazines, cosmetic surgeries, online communication, virtual reality technology, electronic database... By recounting a science fiction, the author introduces her body theory – the postmodern forms of technological embodiment: (1) the marked body which bears the cultural identities, (2) the laboring body which reproduces materials and culture, (3) the repressed body which means the repression of the material body, and (4) the disappearing body which signals the increasing replaceability of body components. Focusing on gender and racial analysis of hi tech, the author provided a new perspective for us to understand the transformation in the information society.