Sept 11 | introductions | |
Sept 18 | what is life? (first pass) | Margulis, Lynn and Dorian Sagan (1995). “Life: The Eternal Enigma” and “Masters of the Biosphere.” In What Is Life? 12–33, 68–89. |
Sept 25 | what is life? (first pass) | Aristotle (N.D.). De Anima (On the Soul), book I part 1 and book II parts 1-3. Trans. by J.A. Smith. N.P. Web. Thacker, Eugene (2010). “Life and the Living (On Aristotelian Biohorror).” In After Life, 1–24. |
Oct 2 | life at the extremes | Lovelock, James (1979). “Introductory,” “Gaia and Man,” and “Epilogue.” In Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth, 1–12, 107–122, 141–150. |
Oct 9 | No Class – Indigenous Peoples’ Day | |
Oct 16 | life and/as information | Kay, Lily E. (2000). “Production of Discourse: Cybernetics, Information, Life.” In Who Wrote the Book of Life: A History of the Genetic Code, 73–127. |
Oct 23 | the racial & sexual politics of genetics research | Nelson, Alondra (2016). “Introduction” and “Racial Politics After the Genome.” In The Social Life of DNA, 1–26, 157–166. |
Oct 30 | the racial & sexual politics of genetics research | Haraway, Donna (1979). “The Biological Enterprise: Sex, Mind, and Profit from Human Engineering to Sociobiology.” Radical History Review 20: 206–237. |
Nov 6 | biology & power | Foucault, Michel (2000 [1974]). “The Birth of Social Medicine.” In Power: Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984, 134–156. Foucault, Michel (1990 [1978]). “Right to Death and Power over Life.” In The History of Sexuality, Volume One, 133–160. |
Nov 13 | governing life | Thacker, Eugene (2005). “Bioinformatic Bodies and the Problem of ‘Life Itself.’” In The Global Genome: Biotechnology, Politics, and Culture, 51–90. |
Nov 20 | the political economy of biology | Cooper, Melinda (2008). “Life Beyond the Limits: Inventing the Bioeconomy.” In Life as Surplus: Biotechnology & Capitalism in the Neoliberal Era, 15–50. |
Nov 27 | life & its doubles | Untitled Johnston, John (2008). “Vital Cells: Cellular Automata, Artificial Life, Autopoiesis.” In The Allure of Machinic Life: Cybernetics, Artificial Life, and the New AI, 165–214. |
Dec 4 | technologies of living | Untitled Roosth, Sophia (2017). “Life by Design: Evolution and Creation Tales in Synthetic Biology.” In Synthetic: How Life Got Made, 21–52. |
Dec 11 | artifice & art | Pein, Corey (2016). “Everybody Freeze! The Extropians Want Your Body.” The Baffler 30: N.P. Popper, Ben (2012). “Cyborg America: Inside the Strange New World of Basement Body Hackers.” The Verge (Aug. 8): N.P. C.f., supplemental YouTube video: “Biohackers: A Journey into Cyborg America” Weise, Jillian (2016). “The Dawn of the ‘Tryborg.’” The New York Times (Nov. 30): N.P. |
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