The First Cyborg and First World War Bodies as Anti-War Propaganda

Bibliographic Data

ID12914643
AuthorsKate Macdonald (0000-0003-2372-0775, University of Reading, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume9
Issue4
Pages348-366
Publication date2016-07-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of War and Culture Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1752-6272 • E-ISSN: 1752-6280
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17526272.2016.1185276
OpenAlexW2462822872
LanguageEN
References cited20

This article discusses a play published in The Strand Magazine during the First World War which features a cyborg presenting anti-war and pacifist messages, used by The Strand to create anti-German propaganda. The article draws on theories of disability, cyborgs and the posthuman, and from new research on wartime fiction magazines. The importance of the cyborg character, Soldier 241, for the literary history of science fiction is explored by focusing on the relations between the mechanical and the impaired body, and on the First World War as a nexus for technological, surgical and military development. As a cyborg, this character reflects politicized desires that the wartime authorities did not acknowledge: a longing for the end of war, and refusal to countenance a society that rejected the impaired body

Aesthetics · Art · Character (mathematics · First world war · German · Humanities · Literature · Nexus (standard · Political science · Posthuman · World War II · Empathy and Medical Education · Engineering · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · History · Law · Visual Culture and Art Theory

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