On Bodies, Transformations, and Becomings in Contemporary Feminist Science Fiction

Pacheco Padilla, Vanessa and Baker, Brian (2023) On Bodies, Transformations, and Becomings in Contemporary Feminist Science Fiction. PhD thesis, Lancaster University.

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Abstract

The purpose of this research is to analyse, from a feminist perspective, how Science Fiction texts that come from English- and Spanish-speaking traditions of Feminist Science Fiction and were written in the last twenty years explore specific gender constructs and anxieties regarding the body, its transformations, and becomings. The analysis focuses on how feminist sf exposes patriarchal configurations, power relations, and gender issues throughout different representations of the body. A close reading of the different texts determines whether sf texts that come from English- and Spanish-speaking countries share a common tradition regarding feminist sf and the portrayal of gender issues such as the body, motherhood, identity, violence, roles, inequality, and sexuality. The first two chapters explore social/political/cultural bodies in utopia and dystopia. The analysis focuses on intersections between power and violence—or the lack of—and representations of the body and its transformations, including masculinised and feminised female bodies. Chapters III and IV analyse posthuman bodies in dystopian/post-apocalyptic spaces. The focal point of analysis is the intersections between power and violence—or the threat of it—and bodily transformations that reverse gender roles. The last chapter examines multi-bodied bodies that challenge notions of corporeality and gender. The analysis addresses the concept of embodiment through a religious lens and the possibilities this offers. The comparative nature of this study–beyond the Anglophone tradition–offers a fresh perspective on how Feminist sf that comes from different traditions depict gender issues, particularly regarding the body and its transformations. This research will enrich the current field of literary criticism from an interdisciplinary perspective. By expanding and providing new light on the issues portrayed in the texts written by sf contemporary writers from diverse countries, and thus, diverse social and cultural contexts, the current discussion on gender issues in sf can be strengthened.