The ante-tempus novel
Prevention and Patienthood in Recent Speculative Fiction
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5726151 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Benedetta Liorsi (0000-0002-0166-8729, Lancaster University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 33 |
| Issue | 6 |
| Pages | 983-1003 |
| Publication date | 2019-07-03 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Textual Practice (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0950-236X • E-ISSN: 1470-1308 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0950236x.2017.1365757 |
| OpenAlex | W2749641151 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 4 |
This article introduces a new medical subjectivity generated by the drive towards prevention that increasingly organises the discourses and practices of medicine, as well as war, state security and economy. The ante-tempus patient is the subjectivity emerging at a moment in time in which medical advances and interventions are shaping the present according to future needs, in order to face anticipated threats to human health. Contemporary science fiction offers a fertile ground for investigating this, as well as the resulting anxieties about mass-medicalisation. The first part of the article explores the concept of preventative mass-medicalisation and the exploitation and harvesting of ‘health’ in neoliberal societies. In the second part, the speculative novel The Unit [Ninni Holmqvist, trans. Marlaine Delargy (Oxford: Oneworld Publications, [2006] 2010)] exemplifies and contextualises the key features of ante-tempus patienthood. This medical subjectivity embodied by the novel’s main characters represents the outcome of the attempt to create a medical utopia. In this society of medical management, biological exploitation, forced medicalisation and self-sacrifice merge with neoliberal ideology, casting the discourse of preventative medicine in dystopian terms
Aesthetics · Biopower · CLARION · Dystopia · Embodied cognition · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Ideology · Medicalization · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Subjectivity · Utopia · Contemporary Literature and Criticism · Law · Medicine · Philosophy · Psychology · Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,4 |
| Citation span | 2021 - 2021 (1) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |