A Genealogy of the Extraterrestrial in American Culture
A Genealogy of the Extraterrestrial in American Culture
A Genealogy of the Extraterrestrial in American Culture
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sensibilities, though one that would none<strong>the</strong>less mark an anticipation <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> organic mach<strong>in</strong>e<br />
promised by current developments <strong>in</strong> bio- and nano-technologies.<br />
The emergence <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> so-called gray is even more marked by its <strong>in</strong>creased focus on<br />
questions <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> body. Here for <strong>the</strong> first time <strong>the</strong> imag<strong>in</strong>ed future <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> human was cast <strong>in</strong> a<br />
form repulsive to human sensibilities. Not only does <strong>the</strong> gray not <strong>in</strong>cite feel<strong>in</strong>gs <strong>of</strong> admiration<br />
and identification, it <strong>in</strong>vites <strong>the</strong> opposite—loath<strong>in</strong>g and abjection. Unlike <strong>the</strong> saucer, <strong>the</strong> gray<br />
<strong>of</strong>fers a vague semblance <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> human—bipedal, roughly symmetrical features. This<br />
resemblance heightens ra<strong>the</strong>r than undoes <strong>the</strong> gray’s uncann<strong>in</strong>ess. The gray resists identification<br />
both <strong>in</strong> its grotesque form and apparent emotional vacuity. The gray <strong>in</strong> itself does not suggest<br />
<strong>the</strong> mobility <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> subject as much as its absence or its radical restructur<strong>in</strong>g. In terms <strong>of</strong> an<br />
expanded field <strong>of</strong> play for race and gender, <strong>the</strong> gray seems to push that expansion to a moment <strong>of</strong><br />
collapse or disappearance. The gray is apparently without race or gender—a figure that<br />
embodies <strong>the</strong> collapse or suspension <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> dist<strong>in</strong>ctions entailed by those two categories. To<br />
identify with <strong>the</strong> gray is a struggle for those who encounter <strong>the</strong>m, a struggle that seems to capture<br />
<strong>the</strong> emergent ability so prized by Kaja Silverman’s treatise on <strong>the</strong> expanded field <strong>of</strong> love—<strong>the</strong><br />
ability to identify with <strong>the</strong> socially disprized body.<br />
In her essay The Promise <strong>of</strong> Monsters, Donna Haraway draws <strong>the</strong> reader's attention to <strong>the</strong><br />
importance <strong>of</strong> "<strong>in</strong>appropriate/ d o<strong>the</strong>rs" <strong>in</strong> imag<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>g what she describes as a post-human future;<br />
"To be <strong>in</strong>appropriate/ d is not to fit <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> taxon, to be dislocated from <strong>the</strong> available maps<br />
specify<strong>in</strong>g k<strong>in</strong>ds <strong>of</strong> actors and k<strong>in</strong>ds <strong>of</strong> narratives." 326<br />
Haraway argues that <strong>in</strong> order to envision a<br />
future that constitutes a radical departure from <strong>the</strong> present, it is crucial to both shift <strong>the</strong><br />
perception <strong>of</strong> what counts as an agent and to seek out narrative structures that take us<br />
326 Donna Haraway, “The Promise <strong>of</strong> Monsters: A Regenerative Politics for Inappropriate/d O<strong>the</strong>rs" <strong>in</strong> Cultural<br />
Studies, ed. Lawrence Grossberg, Cary Nelson, and Paula A. Treichler (New York: Routledge, 1992) 299.<br />
236