Atomic-Antarctic terminal zone
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5726468 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Fabienne Collignon (0000-0002-4911-0302, University of Sheffield, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 523-541 |
| Publication date | 2020-04-02 |
| 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.2014.996246 |
| OpenAlex | W2582838744 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 10 |
This article is concerned with the emergence of proto-cybernetic gadgets and specimen in Antarctica. The essay’s starting point is that the Cold War was literalised at the South Pole, which also operates as a shadowy double of the overtly militarised Arctic. What happens in Antarctica is a secret assimilation of space into the American Cold War perimeter by way of weapons technology, most notably through the gyrocompass (which develops into the black box navigation systems for ballistic missiles) and the man–machine amalgamation. This assimilation and emergence are traced at hand of exploration narratives (Harold Ponting; Douglas Mawson; Richard Byrd) as well as science fiction stories (H. P. Lovecraft; John W. Campbell, Jr.) that precede the Cold War, but whose forging of a superman-specimen anticipate the conceptualisation of Antarctica as a Cold War space. The South Pole operates as zone of rehearsal for superpower merging: the explorers become prototype cyborgs whose expeditions point towards the containment culture, epitomised in the gyrocompass/black box technology, of the Cold War
Archaeology · Art · Art history · Cold war · Geography · Literature · Narrative · North pole · Physical geography · Political science · Politics · Superman · Superpower · The arctic · History · Law · Polar Research and Ecology · Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life · Twentieth Century Scientific Developments · Geology · Oceanography
The Closed World
The Literary Cold War, 1945 to Vietnam
Inventing accuracy
A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful
Who goes there? Science, fiction, and belonging in Antarctica
Assault on the unknown
Hitler's Antarctic base
The History of the Black Box
Little America. Aerial Exploration in the Antarctic and the Flight to the South Pole
Becoming-icy
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |