(DOWNLOAD) "Japanese Science Fiction and Conceptions of the (Human) Subject (Critical Essay)" by CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture # eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Japanese Science Fiction and Conceptions of the (Human) Subject (Critical Essay)
- Author : CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
- Release Date : January 01, 2010
- Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines,Books,Professional & Technical,Education,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 92 KB
Description
The non-essentialism of the "human" as a category has been science fiction's playground since its very beginning; however, since the 1970s and until today, the "nonhuman" challenge to the human has culminated, both in science theory and in cultural imagination. In this article I put into question the cultural context of this transformation that--as Bruno Latour has suggested--has started taking place in Western thought, using as a case study a Japanese science fiction film: Casshern (directed and written by Kazuaki Kiriya, 2004) takes place in an undefined future, when Asia and Europe have just come out of a half-a-century-long war, whose winner, the "Eastern Federation," has taken control of the "Eurasian continent," the land situated between the two competitors. However, "pockets of resistance" still remain in Eurasia, fighting the new oppressive regime of Eastern Federation, leading to a new war that this time threatens to erase the whole human race, as the already long-term use of biological weapons has spread epidemic diseases and heavy environmental pollution. Although the film draws from elements of different scifi subgenres, it combines a classic Frankensteinian theme with cyberpunk elements. In many respects, we are placed in a cyberpunk-like setting: dystopian and polluted city--but also country--landscape, an authoritarian regime trying to eliminate resistance, a mysterious corporation that serves the army's interests and wants to control biotechnological research and, later on, a war from the part of genetically engineered nonhumans, the products of this research, claiming their rights from "real" humans: professor Azuma makes a stunning announcement in the forum of the Health Ministry of the Eastern Federation. In the genome of a primitive tribe he discovered the neocells, that is, cells that can be converted in any other human cell and regenerate human tissue, ultimately making possible the cure of all diseases. Hence, the "human regeneration technology" that will make true this scientific discovery becomes a matter of life and death not only for the country's population, but also for the old and sick monarch, general Kamijo, and for Azuma himself, whose wife, the "gentle Midori", is dying from an incurable illness. However, "it is taboo to suggest that our original genes need improving", so the government has to find subtle ways to expedite the research, hence the involvement of the mysterious "Nikko Hiral" corporation, which offers Azuma the lab that he needs for his experiments. The narration unfolds around the axis of the relationship of Azuma with his son, Tetsuya. Tetsuya decides to go to the war, against his father's will, and despite the fact that he just got engaged. However, he soon encounters the war's inhuman face when he is forced to kill a defenseless woman with her child in a peasant village of Eurasia, and later he himself gets killed, trying to protect the life of a baby from the savage fury of the warriors, who consider the people of Eurasia as "terrorists." However, a few hours after Tetsuya's death, a mystical life-transcendence takes place: in Azuma's lab the "regenerated" human organs that float in a tank full of neocell organic liquid suddenly begin to form human bodies, rising alive out of the water.