Humbling the human
Posthuman explorations in contemporary short fiction
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 13005294 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Elke D’hoker (0000-0003-1326-0939, KU Leuven, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 10 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 135-148 |
| Publication date | 2020-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Short Fiction in Theory and Practice (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2043-0701 • E-ISSN: 2043-071X |
| Publisher | Intellect (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1386/fict_00023_1 |
| OpenAlex | W3133871503 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 3 |
In a context of manmade global warming, ecological destruction and species extinction, posthumanist scholars have advocated moving beyond the anthropocentrism that determines western thinking in favour of an embedded and embodied interspecies relationality. If these remain fairly abstract notions in the work of critics such as Donna Haraway and Rosi Braidotti, contemporary short fiction provides many interesting examples of these alternative forms of being and becoming. The short story seems especially suited to exploring this decentring of the human subject, given its own status as a liminal, ‘minor’ or ‘humble’ genre and its long tradition of exploring human–animal relations in animal stories. This article demonstrates how contemporary short stories by Lauren Groff, Claire-Louise Bennett, Sarah Hall, Sara Baume and Louise Ehrdrich stage a profoundly biocentric perspective by moving beyond animal stories’ traditional modes of the fabular and the figural towards a realistic depiction of our creaturely existence in experiences that may be at once empowering and terrifying
Aesthetics · Anthropocentrism · Art · Context (archaeology · Depiction · Embodied cognition · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Liminality · Literature · Perspective (graphical · Posthuman · Posthumanism · Sociology · Subjectivity · Visual arts · Ecocriticism and Environmental Literature · Geographies of human-animal interactions · History · Philosophy · Posthumanist Ethics and Activism
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,17 |
| Citation span | 2020 - 2020 (1) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |