Alien chic

About this book

"Alien Chic provides a cultural history of the alien since the 1950s, asking why our attitudes to aliens have shifted from fear to affection, and what this can tell us about how we now see ourselves and others." "Neil Badmington begins by exploring how our relationship with aliens is inscribed in films such as The War of the Worlds, Mars Attacks!, Mission to Mars, and Independence Day. He then considers how thinkers such as Descartes, Barthes, Freud, Lyotard and Derrida have conceptualised what it means to be human (and post-human)." "The book then examines the concept of posthumanism in an age in which the lines between what is human and what is non-human are increasingly blurred by advances in science and technology, for example cloning and genetic engineering, and the development of AI and cyborgs. This leads to the question of whether or not our current embracing of all things 'alien' - in the form of extraterrestrial gadgets or abduction narratives, for instance - stems from a desire to reaffirm ourselves as 'human' at a moment of radical uncertainty."--Jacket.