For a long time, humans self-evidently considered themselves as the centre of the world and all beings, creating hierarchies among species and within humanity itself. This world view is based on humanist values and conceptions such as ‘otherness’ through which human identify themselves and, apparently, get integrity. Due to various reasons, humanism and its idea(l)s and perceptions are more and more being called into question and criticized. Thus, this paper engages in an approach to have a critical posthuman look at literature. For this purpose, the series Rick and Morty (2013), which has become part of popular culture and reveals numerous posthuman(ist) motives and topics, will be analyzed with regard to the following research question: Is Rick and Morty motivated by a posthumanist drive that permanently questions the dynamics of otherness which underlies humanism?
Following from this, further questions arise and will be dealt with: How is otherness depicted? In which way are otherness and haunting spectres connected with each other? It will be shown that especially through the process of othering, namely, on the one hand, by creating otherness and, on the other hand, by transferring (or imaging) humanist conception to (or via) another species, the very foundation of human(ist) self-conception is being exhibited, reflected, and shattered. Moreover, the analysis will emphasize how Rick and Morty raises criticism and awareness on both humanism and posthumanism, that is its implicit appeal to radically rethink humanist value in order to survive in and (synergetically) connect with an environment and a society that experience radical, especially technological and existential change In literature, posthuman motives and topics can most strikingly be found in the genre of science fiction as it constantly strives to create new worlds and realities within the logics of science and, therefore, reconsiders and engenders criticism on the extratextual world. However, literary texts of science fiction still contain moments, structures, or endings that draw on rather humanist values and expectations, e.g. by dealing with a crisis by humanist means. These literary mechanisms can often only be identified by stepping out of and breaking through the boundaries of a humanist way of reading.
Table of Content
1 Introduction
2 Concepts and Methods of Posthumanism
3 A Critical Posthumanist Reading of Rick & Morty (2013)
3.1 Creating the Monstrous Other: Between Anxieties and Desires
3.2 The Humanist Non-Humans: The Crisis of the Plutonians
4 Conclusion and Outlook
5 Works Cited
1 Introduction
For a long time, humans self-evidently consider themselves as the center of the world and all beings, creating hierarchies among species and within humanity itself. This world view is based on humanist values and conceptions such as ‘otherness' through which human identify themselves and, apparently, get integrity. Due to various reasons - like technological developments, ecological crises resulting from the exploitation of world's resources, animals, and human ‘minorities', or the systematic categorization of and discrimination against alleged inferior living beings - humanism and its idea(l)s and perceptions are more and more being called into question and criticized. At least in academic terms, this is particularly realized through a ‘posthumanist' mind-set. Terms like ‘posthumanism' or ‘posthumanist' did not come up recently but “they have only really started to receive attention in contemporary theory and philosophy in the last two decades” (Herbrechter, 2013, preface). Especially in the course of new discoveries and research fields in “bio-, nano-, neuro- and infotechnologies” (Herbrechter, 2013, preface) and due to digitalism and media changes, a new form of society, a so-called ‘technoculture' (Braidotti, 2009, p. 526), requires a new way of thinking and a de- and reconstruction of existing assumptions of the human being and its status in the world or, rather, in the universe. In literature, posthuman motives and topics can most strikingly be found in the genre of science fiction as it constantly strives to create new worlds and realities within the logics of science and, therefore, reconsiders and engenders criticism on the extratex- tual world. However, literary texts of science fiction (including series and movies), such as Terminator 2: Judgement Day (see Cohen, 1994, pp. 260-262; Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, pp. 98-100), still contain moments, structures, or endings that draw on rather humanist values and expectations, e.g. by dealing with a crisis by humanist means. These literary mechanisms can often only be identified by stepping out of and breaking through the boundaries of a humanist way of reading. Thus, this paper engages in an approach to have a critical posthuman look at literature. For this purpose, the series Rick and Morty (2013), which has become part of popular culture and reveals numerous posthuman(ist) motives and topics, will be analyzed with regards to the following research question: Is Rick and Morty motivated by a posthumanist drive that permanently questions the dynamics of otherness which underlies humanism? Following from this, further questions arise and will be dealt with: How is otherness depicted? In which way are otherness and haunting specters connected with each other? How are (the values of) posthumanism and humanism thematized, portrayed, and contrasted with each other? Do elements or scenes exist that break with posthumanism or that try to assemble humanist and posthumanist paradigms in order to emphasize the chances and risks of both of them?
Since there is a great variety of possible material in the series regarding the research question, this paper mainly focuses on analyzing two episodes, namely Rick Potion No. 9 (s. 1, e. 6) and Something Ricked This Way Comes (s.1, e. 9). Both episodes, yet, contain two main plots of which only one each will be considered. These plots critically deal with both humanist and posthumanist values in posthuman scenarios that, creatively and technologically motivated, imply concept(s) of ‘otherness' and processes of ‘othering'. Foregoing and as a basis for the analysis, a brief definition of posthumanism, the concept of ‘otherness', and hauntology must be given by, mainly, referring to Rosi Braidotti's “Animals, Anomalies, and Inorganic Others” (2009), Stefan Herbrechter's Posthumanism. A Critical Analysis (2013), and Mark Fisher's “What is Hauntology?” (2012). Also, Herbrechter and Ivan Callus' article on “What is a Posthumanist Reading?” (2008) will provide the methodical frame for the posthumanist reading of Rick and Morty. Atthe end of this paper, an outlook on further possible analytic material as well as topics will be suggested to emphasize how recent science fiction series can function and be seen as the literary manifestation of a new, posthuman way of thinking and a creative approach to make aware of and criticize extra-textual circumstances and human(ist) practices.
It will be shown that especially through the process of othering, namely, on the one hand, by creating otherness and, on the other hand, by transferring (or imaging) humanist conception to (or via) an other species, the very foundation of human(ist) selfconception is being exhibited, reflected, and shattered. Moreover, the analysis will emphasize how Rick and Morty raises criticism and awareness on both humanism and posthumanism, that is its implicit appeal to radically rethink humanist value in order to survive in and (synergetically) connect with an environment and a society that experience radical, especially technological and existential changes.
2 Concepts and Methods of Posthumanism
To read in a posthuman way requires to read as if one were not human. It, thus, “will proceed ‘against the grain' [...], against one's self, against one's own deep-seated self-understanding as a member or even representative of a certain ‘species'” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 95). Therefore, one has “to project an otherness to the human [.] and to locate oneself simultaneously within identity and otherness” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 95 f.) in order to productively use strategies of a radical deconstruction such as “defamiliarization, estrangement, and disidentification” (Braidotti, 2009, p. 526). This ‘otherness' and the process of ‘othering' have emerged fromHumanism and isbased on an anthropocentric world view that engenders hierarchy among and within species, and an exploitation of those who are considered inferior (the non-human, non-white, non-male, malformed, etc.) and, hence, as “anomalous, deviant, and monstruous” (Braidotti, 2009, p. 526). In posthumanism and a posthumanist reading, humanist forms of hierarchization and integrity and humans position in the world (or universe) are being challenged through “the deconstruction of the integrity of the human and the other, of the natural and the alienable” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 96). Or, to put it another way, “itis interrogating the violence of the nature/culture dichotomy and that the distinction between object and subject are not what we thought they were” (Fishel, 2017, p. 51 f.). Humanist modes of subjectivity and objectification consider other, ‘inferior' life (especially but not only animals) as “primary material products” (Braidotti, 2009, p. 529), which is why an agenda of posthumanism is to recognize “that we humans and animals are in this together” (Braidotti, 2009, p. 528). Processes of objectification and exploitation can also be found apart from living beings, i.e. in the exploitation of the world's resources which has led to global ecological crisis. Therefore, Stefanie Fishel exceedsBraidotti's desire for a more just human-animal relationship by also implying a recognition of ecologies and biosphere (2017, p. 55)and, together with her co-authors, states that in order “[t]o survive, we must ask questions that are intimately connected to capitalism, modernity, and oppression” (Burke et al., 2016, p. 500).
The concept of ‘otherness' in posthumanism is, yet, not abolished but reassessed and relocated as it is “understood as a threat or promise [and] is a product of human anxiety and desire” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 97).The ‘other'is visualized and depicted through humanism's outcast (nonhuman, alien, etc.), i.e. anxieties and desires (Herbrechter, 2013, preface), which, therefore, “reflect current ‘posthumanising' practices, technologies and fantasies” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 97). The oppositions of the human and the nonhuman, in a posthuman reading and according to Herbrechter/Callus, are to be pointed out and their alleged and, in a humanist sense, vital differences between each other must be strategically ruptured so that the “protection of the ‘essential purity' of the categories” (2008, p. 97) can be deranged. Thus, posthumanism “challenge[s] the entire humanist system of categorization and exclusion” (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 36). This already points to the posthumanist question (or rather paradigm) of “the end of humans as biological species and the dissolution of human ‘nature' from the inside” (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 25). This radical way of rethinking the human species is, although not restricted to it, strongly connected to current technological developments, such as in “bio-, info- nano-, or cogno-” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 96) sciences. The notion of life itself is being reconsidered as “[p]arts of biosciences or ‘life sciences' have been producing anorganic, artificial life forms on the basis of a new ‘postbiological' notion of life” (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 26 f.). That is, processes of and developments in cyborgization, gene technology, genetic engineering, and gene splicing engender “entirely new forms of (de-essentializing) ‘hybridity' within [and beyond] human ‘nature'” (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 27). In her “Cyborg Manifesto” (2011), Donna Haraway describes the ‘posthuman', a human of and within technoculture, as (becoming of)a “Cyborg” which (or who) is no longer restricted to the concepts of dichotomy, dualism, and “différance” (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 22 emphasis in original), and, thus, can be seen as a symbol of new forms of hybridity and transspeciesism. Further, or rather more concrete examples (or ‘creations') of the technological hybridization of beings are clones, chimeras, designer babies (Herbrechter, 2013, p. 27), humanoid hybrids (Braidotti, 2009, p. 526), or even a “melting away into ‘formlessness'” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 100).
A posthumanist reading, thus, deconstructively aims to emphasize and evaluate realizations of previous discourses and motives within texts, i.e. textual opposites, paradoxes, and ambiguities, moments where posthumanism and humanism (and also life forms, discourses, etc.) blend, “examples of posthuman representations in terms of their potential for a critical post -humanism” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 97), moments of and without posthuman technology (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 97), notes of ‘potentia' of bodies and entities (i.e. to become the other and hence “increase one's capacity to enter into further relations and to grow” (Braidotti, 2009, p. 531)), of anxiety and/or desire, and, closely related to the previous, ‘specters' that haunt the text and human(ism) and which, in actuality, is either a “that which is no longer but [...] still effective as a virtuality [or a] that which [...] has not yet happened [but is] already effective in the virtual” (Fisher, 2012, p. 19).
As already mentioned, science fiction in its very core builds on motives, paradigms, and discourses that are intertwined with posthumanist theory. With technological development as its basis point of reference, science fiction establishes and displays (ideas and images of) parallel universes or dimensions, time and intergalactic travelling, forms, societies, and systems of non-human (or not only human) beings and their encounter with and relation to humans, etc. Its formal frame of alienation challenges recipients' expectations by using distinct strategies such as depicting and/or thematizing ambiguities, showing processes and results of hybridization, establishing a so-called ‘Novum', or embedding current global or regional circumstances into a fictional, posthuman setting (and hence making aware of and criticizing them) (cf. Gözen, 2012, p. 31 f.; Dath, 2019, p. 85). However, science fiction “often remains a crypto-humanist genre, producing closures that reaffirm a radical difference between human and non-human other” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 98). That is why a (critical) posthumanist reading of science fiction aims to analyze “the subversive potential of the foreclosed non-human other, and [to] examin[e] whether it could lead to alternative nonhumanist notions of humanity and non-humanity” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 98). In narrative texts, particularly moments of (human) crisis can be analyzed to disclose humanity's integrity “in the face of posthuman(ist)” and the text's “desire for non-contamination, for non-assimilation within the posthuman other” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 104). The following posthumanist reading, consequently, will be “critical both of representations of the posthuman and of humanism” to discuss the depiction of otherness, ambiguity (including anxieties and desires), integrity, and hauntology to emphasize the “potential [of the human] that remains to be defined or realized” (Herbrechter and Callus, 2008, p. 97).
3 A Critical Posthumanist Reading of Rick & Morty (2013)
Throughout the adventures of the two title-giving protagonists Rick and Morty (grandfather and grandson), a great variety of motives, characters, and pictures are being used that, both critically as well as affirmatively, deal with ideas and paradigms of science fiction, posthumanism, and, also, humanism. Technology related experiments (such as genetic experiments like Rick's creation of ‘Abradolf Lincler', who is stuck in-between his own moral dilemma, or ‘Pickle Rick', ‘who' is Rick's own bodily transformation into a pickle and, later, a powerful hybrid cyborg form of machine, pickle, and human) and devices (or novums) (e.g. portal guns, which enable interdimensional travelling within seconds, or an IQ-enhancing helmet for Morty's pet dog, which empowers the dog and later its whole species to become autonomous, self-developing, and eventually, superior to the humans); multi- and transspeciesism and interspecies conflicts; emotional and social behavior and relationships of other beings (like an intergalactic fly which, after being shot, turns out to be a loving father); different forms of language(s) and currencies; or intergalactic popular culture and advertisement, to name merely some examples, highlight the posthumanist ambitions and approaches that Rick and Morty embraces. The following analyses of two episodes critically deal with the complex and, partially, subtle approaches of the series to challenge humanists deeply ingrained beliefs and conceptions and, therefore, to creatively (but still critically) unfold and emphasize new, posthuman ways of thinking.
3.1 Creating the Monstrous Other: Between Anxieties and Desires
In the episode Rick Potion No. 9 (s. 1, e. 6), Rick infects the whole worlds' population (except for his own family due to incompatibility with blood relatives) with a serum that was designed to help Morty with his request that Jessica, an older pupil at his school, would return his love for her. The serums - Rick eventually develops and uses three mixtures - are results of genetic experiments with different animal DNA as their basis(and due to its radical effectiveness and practical application can be seen as a ‘Novum') . That is, the first serum is made of voles DNA which bond with their mates for life and is, therefore, the obvious choice for Rick to accomplish Morty's desire. As, due to an outbreak of the flu at school beforehand, many more people get ‘infected' and desire Morty, Rick uses the DNA of mantis as a supposedly natural counterpart for they only copulate once before the female devours the male.
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