![]() ![]() ![]() From the very beginning »this thing« (del Rey, 119) is ostentatiously gendered through stereotypical markers of femininity in every conceivable way. ![]() In Lester del Rey’s science fiction short story Helen O’Loy (1938) readers encounter a beautiful, alluring robot, »K2W88« (del Rey, 119), who not only resembles a real woman, but is even favorably compared to and named after Helen of Troy. A return to the Golden Age of Science Fiction reveals obvious structural similarities, such as a male protagonist falling in love with a strongly feminized and sexualized machine, but also significant differences, which can be attributed to the cultural discourses that dominate different historical periods. ![]() Apart from a synchronic look at how these variations on a theme are handled in detail, there is also a need to open up a diachronic perspective, which involves a well-established canon of predecessors on the one hand and a long tradition of feminist scholarship on the other. This paper sets out to contextualize a number of contemporary android love stories, such as Jonathan Luna and Sarah Vaughn’s ALEX + ADA (2013–2015), Spike Jonze’s Her (2013) and Alex Garland’s Ex Machina (2014), by looking at the way the creators engage with gender stereotypes and power relations. ✺ man wants flesh and blood, not rubber and metal.« ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |