The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Posthumanist Transmedia: David Blandy’s The World After (2019)

Posthumanist Transmedia: David Blandy’s The World After (2019)
Posthumanist Transmedia: David Blandy’s The World After (2019)
Transmedia storytelling can be a powerful tool for representing and narrativizing our world, but also for building a better, more ethical present. In particular, transmedia’s digital lens can reveal important new possibilities, particularly when approached through a posthumanist perspective. When we think of ‘the posthuman’ we might initially envision cyborgs, aliens, and monsters, but the theoretical framework of critical posthumanism takes a different approach to this term. As Stefan Herbrechter points out in the Posthuman Glossary, the ‘post’ in posthumanism on the one hand “signifies a desire or indeed a need to somehow go beyond humanism (or the human), while on the other hand, since the post- also necessarily repeats what it prefixes, it displays an awareness that neither humanism nor the human can in fact be overcome in any straightforward dialectical or historical fashion (for example, in the sense: after the human, the posthuman)” (Herbrechter 2018: 94). As a result of this double vision, looking forward and back at the same time, acts of critical posthumanist imagining remain firmly grounded in the present moment. In Herbrechter’s words, a critical posthumanism “functions more like an anamnesis and a rewriting of the human and humanism’ than an erasure, explicitly resisting transhumanist or apocalyptic visions of the future through which humans might “‘argue themselves out of the picture’ precisely at a time when climate change caused by the impact of human civilisation (cf. Anthropocene) calls for urgent and responsible, human action” (Herbrechter 2018: 95). David Blandy’s 2019 exhibition The World After offers an excellent illustration of the possibilities of posthumanist transmedia for imagining a world outside ourselves, and beyond the dystopian capitalist realities of the contemporary Anthropocene.
posthumanism, transmedia, roleplaying, apocalypse, futurism, conservation
Peter Lang
de Bruin-Molé, Megen
50c0d19d-e9c9-4ad4-9b14-8645139e1ef9
Bacon, Simon
de Bruin-Molé, Megen
50c0d19d-e9c9-4ad4-9b14-8645139e1ef9
Bacon, Simon

de Bruin-Molé, Megen (2021) Posthumanist Transmedia: David Blandy’s The World After (2019). In, Bacon, Simon (ed.) Transmedia Cultures: A Companion. Peter Lang.

Record type: Book Section

Abstract

Transmedia storytelling can be a powerful tool for representing and narrativizing our world, but also for building a better, more ethical present. In particular, transmedia’s digital lens can reveal important new possibilities, particularly when approached through a posthumanist perspective. When we think of ‘the posthuman’ we might initially envision cyborgs, aliens, and monsters, but the theoretical framework of critical posthumanism takes a different approach to this term. As Stefan Herbrechter points out in the Posthuman Glossary, the ‘post’ in posthumanism on the one hand “signifies a desire or indeed a need to somehow go beyond humanism (or the human), while on the other hand, since the post- also necessarily repeats what it prefixes, it displays an awareness that neither humanism nor the human can in fact be overcome in any straightforward dialectical or historical fashion (for example, in the sense: after the human, the posthuman)” (Herbrechter 2018: 94). As a result of this double vision, looking forward and back at the same time, acts of critical posthumanist imagining remain firmly grounded in the present moment. In Herbrechter’s words, a critical posthumanism “functions more like an anamnesis and a rewriting of the human and humanism’ than an erasure, explicitly resisting transhumanist or apocalyptic visions of the future through which humans might “‘argue themselves out of the picture’ precisely at a time when climate change caused by the impact of human civilisation (cf. Anthropocene) calls for urgent and responsible, human action” (Herbrechter 2018: 95). David Blandy’s 2019 exhibition The World After offers an excellent illustration of the possibilities of posthumanist transmedia for imagining a world outside ourselves, and beyond the dystopian capitalist realities of the contemporary Anthropocene.

Text
Posthumanism and transmedia (de bruin) - Author's Original
Restricted to Repository staff only
Request a copy
Text
bruin mole chapter proof - Proof
Restricted to Repository staff only
Request a copy

More information

Submitted date: 4 June 2020
Accepted/In Press date: 21 December 2020
Published date: 30 May 2021
Keywords: posthumanism, transmedia, roleplaying, apocalypse, futurism, conservation

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 442568
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/442568
PURE UUID: a4d3ae73-1cd0-4f4f-8736-e3bd7462ca08
ORCID for Megen de Bruin-Molé: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0003-4243-1995

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 20 Jul 2020 16:30
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 03:49

Export record

Contributors

Editor: Simon Bacon

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×