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Nonhuman in Popular Culture

Description

Wherever we look, images of non-human seem to surround us. Across the popular culture, the sheer volume of its representations is staggering – making it almost impossible to imagine contemporary culture without it. In the realm of film and television, the reinvention and reimagining of monstrous beings seems ceaseless. Similarly, video games have become a major site for non-human representations, while literary tradition, too, has already long cultivated a space for the non-human across many genres. Even in visual arts—especially in the realm of comics—the non-human, particularly in the form of various superheroes, has had a prominent role since the genre’s inception. In short, the non-human is far more than a passing trend—it is a cornerstone of our cultural imagination.

The foundation of this project lies in the recognition that the nonhuman is a very specific element within broader cultural production, and thus within our culture as a whole. Not only does it have its own history, but our culture also appears to possess an inexhaustible tendency to continually reconstitute and present the nonhuman in recurring forms. Faced with a flood of iconic figures—monsters, animals, machines, hybrids, divine beings, and natural forces—that challenge and transgress established frameworks of what it means to be human, this project seeks to provide answers to the following questions: why does our culture have such a persistent tendency to produce these figures, and why has this never ceased? How do non-human figures manifest in popular culture? Through what processes and mechanisms are they produced? The aim of the project Nonhuman in Popular Culture is to provide a theoretical framework to offer the specification of the latter. The primary objective of the project is thus to develop a comprehensive theory on the cultural production of the non-human’s representations across popular culture.


Project Stages

The project is organized into four distinct work packages, each focusing on different intersections between the human and the nonhuman. We will employ four different perspectives, each mapping a specific topology within the materials under study. The answers we seek regarding the production of these representations will be traced through an examination of the production process itself and its outcomes. Rather than examining individual media forms in isolation—such as film, literature, comic books, music, or video games—we propose an integrated methodological approach that enables the simultaneous study of these diverse forms. Our exploration will focus on the intersection of the human and non-human across four key ways: 

First (WP1): Non-Human, All Too Human: A Conceptual Examination of the Non-human in Philosophy (coordinator Aleš Bunta, PhD), we will approach the non-human conceptually, engaging with philosophical discussions about human nature and the definition of the both. Second (WP2): Non-Human, Trans-Human: Transcending the Human (coordinator Alenka Zupančič Žerdin, PhD), we will explore the transcendent aspects of the non-human category, examining how it challenges and blurs the boundaries between itself and the human. Third (WP3): Non-Human, Post-Human: Replacing the Human (coordinator Peter Klepec, PhD), we will examine representations in which the non-human seeks to displace or replace the human category entirely. Finally (WP4): Non-Human: The Case for Psychoanalysis (coordinator Tadej Troha, PhD), we will analyse the non-human as an object of theoretical psychoanalysis, drawing on famous case studies and key psychoanalytic concepts. 

Work plan:

WP1: Non-Human, All Too Human: A Conceptual Examination of the Non-human in Philosophy
Task 1.1: Nietzsche’s Rope Between Animal and Overman 
Task 1.2: Nature, Culture, and the Savage: Rousseau’s Legacy in Modern Thought  
Task 1.3: The Poetics of Elements: Exploring the Intersection of Nature and Imagination in Bachelard 
Task 1.4: The Non-Human History: Copernicus, Darwin, Freud, and the Undermining of 
Anthropocentrism
Task 1.5: Untimely Meditations: From Nietzsche to the Environmental Crisis 
Task 1.6: From Human to Non-Human: Reframing the Monstrous through Canguilhem and Foucault

WP2: Non-Human, Trans-Human: Transcending the Human
Task 2.1: The Corporeal and the Trans-Human: Hybridity and Metamorphosis
Task 2.2: Metamorphoses of Fear and Desire: The Trans-Human in Popular Culture 
Task 2.3: The Interdependence of Non-Human Figures: Doubling, Transformation, and 
Inanimate Objects
Task 2.4: The Transhuman in Animation: Exploring Non-Human Figures in Animated Media 
Task 2.5: The Non-Human as Performance: Exploring Transhuman Themes in Animal 
Documentaries and Reality Shows

WP3: Non-Human, Post-Human: Replacing the Human
Task 3.1: The Human Unseated: The Dynamics of Replacement and Transformation in Apocalyptic Narratives
Task 3.2: From Human to Post-Human: The Displacement of Human Identity
Task 3.3: The Blurring of Boundaries: Human and Non-Human in the Post-Human Landscape 
Task 3.4: The Collapse of Inside and Outside: Displacement and Annihilation in Post-Human Horror 
Task 3.5: From Human Folly to Non-Human Resistance: Encountering the Non-Human in Creature Narratives and Eco-Horror
Task 3.6: Nature, Technology, and Transformation: The Intersection of Natural Sciences and Nature as a Catalytic Force
Task 3.7: The Post-Human Sublime: Nature's Revenge and the Collapse of Human Boundaries

WP4: Non-Human: The Case for Psychoanalysis 
Task 4.1: The Non-Human in Popular Culture: Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Cinematic
Representation 
Task 4.2: Non-Human Figures in Freud's Case Studies 
Task 4.3: From Totems to Taboo: The Non-Human in Freud’s Myth of Social Origins 
Task 4.4: The Uncanny and The Nightmare Alley
Task 4.5: The Double, The Other, and The Uncanny Valley 
Task 4.6: The Non-Human Trinity: The Id, The Drive, The Real
 


Research Project

Keywords
popularna kultura
teorija in filozofija kulture
sodobna filozofija
film
literatura
živali
tehnologija
teoretska psihoanaliza

Research Fields
Systematic philosophy, ethics, aesthetics, metaphysics, epistemology, ideology H120