Hybrids as the Apotheosis
"If posthumanism is marked, as Cary Wolfe suggests, by a 'challenge [to] the ontological and ethical divide between humans and non-humans' (2010: 62), then Shori represents the apotheosis of the posthuman vision."
Nayar, Posthumanism 144
Cary Wolfe is suggesting that the heart of posthumanism is the combination and acceptance of a hybrid species between humans and the previous "other". Shori, as a genetically modified human-Ina hybrid, could represent this ideal but the context is which she is place (humanism), restricts her from moving further with that being. Similar to Caesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Shori utilizes her human and Ina aspects cohesively. Neither Caesar, who is born an ape but raised human, nor Shori can function as they do without the knowledge of both worlds that they have gathered. Neither can come to their culmination without the experiences they have had and the nature of their hybrid being. This is dissimilar to Frankenstein's monster as, even though the monster is a literally combination of human and non-human parts, the monster struggles and eventually ends under the ideal of "being human". This makes me wonder if the criteria are a bit more specific than previously implied by Wolfe. Does the non-human side of the hybrid need to be "on level" with humans, such as a biological cousin? Can a posthuman hybrid be a non-human and non-human combination and still be the apotheosis of posthumanism?
Would you consider artifical arms and legs making someone a hybrid? They are working on making them moviable via technology.
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