BODY IMA GES YHREE

respect, it will be a great pity if the whole feminist debate in reproduc-

tive technologies does not use the instruments of analysis and the Mothers, Monsters,
insights of cultural and literary disciplines. I think that reflection on
technology from the perspective of the humanities allows for powerful
new insights on how to criticize scientific practice from within, so as to and Machines
enhance its liberatory potential.
Figuring Out
1 wou ld like to approach the sequence "mothers, monsters, and
machines" both thematical ly and methodologica lly, so as to work out
possible connections between these terms. Because women, the bio-
logical sc iences, and technology are conceptua lly interrelated, there
can not be only one correct connection but, rather, many, heteroge-
neous and potential ly contradictory ones.
The quest for multiple connections-or conjunctions-can also be
rendered methodologically in terms of Donna Haraway's figurations. 1
The term refers to ways of expressing feminist forms of knowledge that
are not caught in a mimetic relationship to dominant scientific dis-
course. This is a way of marking my own difference: as an intellectual
woman who has acquired and earned the right to speak publicly in an
academic context, I have also inherited a tradition of female silence.
Centuries of exclusion of women from the exercise of discursive power
are ringing through my words. In speaking the language of man, I also
intend to let the silence of woman echo gently but firmly; I shall not
conform to the phallogocentric mode. 2 I want to question the status of
feminist theory in terms not on ly of the conceptual tools and the gen-
der-specific perceptions that govern the production of feminist research
but also of the form our perceptions take.
The "nomadic" style is the best suited to the quest for feminist figu-
rations, in the sense of adequate representations of female experience
I wish to thank Margaret R. Higonnet, of the Center for European Studies at
Harvard, Cambridge, U.S., and Sissel Lie, of the Women's Research Center at
Tronheim, Norway or their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES
I ll 77
as that which cannot easily be fitted within the parameters of phallogo- Let us now turn to the thematic or propositional content of my con-
centric language.
stellation of ideas: mothers, monsters and machines.
The configuration of ideas I am trying to set up: mothers, monsters, For the sake of clarity, let me define them: mothers refers to the
machines, is therefore a case study-not only in terms of its proposi-
aternal function of women. By WOMEN I mean not only the biocul-
tional content but also in defining my place of enunciation and, there- entities thus represented, as the empirical subjects of sociopoliti-
fore, my relationship to the readers who are my partners in this discur- cal realities, but also a discursive field: feminist theory. The kind of fem-
sive game. It is a new figuration of feminist subjectivity.
inism 1want to defend rests on the presence and the experience of real-
Quoting Deleuze, 3 I would like to define this relationship as "rhi- life women whose political consciousness is bent on changing the
zomatic"; that is to say not only cerebral, but related to experience,
institution of power in our society.
which implies a strengthened connection between thought and life, a Femin ist theory is a two-layered project involving the critique of
renewed proximity of the thinking process to existential reality. 4 In my existing definitions, representations as well as the elaboration of
thinking, "rhizomatic" thinking leads to what I call a "nomadic" style. native theories about women. Femin ism is the movement that bnngs
Moreover, a "nomadic" connection is not a dualistic or opposi tional into practice the dimension of sexual difference through the critique of
way of thinking 5 but rather one that views discourse as a positive, mul- gender as a power institution. Femin ism is the question; the affirmation
tilayered network of power relations.6
of sexual difference is the answer.
Let me develop the terms of my nomadic network by reference to This point is part icularly important in the light of modern ity's imper-
Foucau ldian critiques of the power of discourse: he argues that the pro- ative to think differently about our historical cond ition. The central
duction of scientific knowledge works as a complex, interrelated net- question seems to be here: how can we affirm the positivity of female
work of truth, power, and desire, centered on the subject as a bodily subjectivity at a time in history when our acquired perceptions "the
entity. In a double movement that I find most politically useful, Foucau lt
subject" are being radically questioned? How can we reconcile
highlights both the normative foundations of theoretical reason and also
recognition of the problematic nature of the notion and the construction
the rational model of power. "Power" thus becomes the name for a
of the subject with the political necessity to posit female subjectivity?
complex set of interconnections, between the spaces where truth and By MACHINES 1mean the scientific, political, and discursive field of
knowledge are produced and the systems of control and domination. 1 technology in the broadest sense of the term. Ever since Heidegger the
shall unwrap my three interrelated notions in the light of this definition philosophy of modernity has been trying to come to terms with techno-
of power.
logical reason. The Frankfurt School refers to it as "instrumental rea-
Last, but not least, this style implies the simultaneous dislocation not son": one that places the end of its endeavors well above the means and
only of my place of enunciation as a feminist intellectual but also suspends all judgment on its inner logic. In my work, as I mentioned in
accordingly of the position of my readers. As my interlocutors I am con- the previous chapter, I approach the technology issue from within the
structing those readers to be "not just" traditional intellectuals and aca- French tradition, following the materialism of Bachelard, Cangui lhem,
demics but also active, interested, and concerned participants in a pro-
and Foucault.
ject of research and experimentation for new ways of thinki ng about By MONSTERS 1mean a third kind of discourse: the history and phi-
human subjectivity in general and female subjectivity in particu lar. 1
losophy of the biological sciences, and relation to difference and
mean to appea l therefore not on ly to a requirement for passionless tru th to different bod ies. Monsters are human beings w ho are born w ith con-
but also to a passionate engagement in the recognition of the theoreti- genital ma lformations of thei r bod ily organ ism. They also represent the
ca l and discursive implications of sexua l difference. In this choice of a
in between, the mixed, the ambivalent as implied in the ancient Greek
theoretical style that leaves ample room for the exploration of subjec-
root of the word monsters, teras, which means both horrible and won-
tivity, I am following the lead of Donna Haraway, whose plea for "pas-
derful, object of aberration and adoration. Since the nineteenth
sionate detachment" in theory making I fu lly share.l
following the classification system of monstrosity by Geoffroy Samt-
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES Ill 79
Hilaire, bodily malformations have been defined in terms of excess, .
far from the power of science over the women's body in favor of
lack, or displacement of organs. 8 Before any such scientific classifica- ever, . . g emphasis on the rights of the fetus or of embryos.
tion was reached, however, natural philosophy had struggled to come ThiS emp as1s 1 against the rights of the mother-and therefore
• •
to terms with these objects of abjection. The constitution of teratology
f the woman- and We have been witnessing systematiC hs1ippages · f
as a science offers a paradigmatic example of the ways in which scien- tween the discourse against genetic manipulations and the r ol
tific rationality dealt with differences of the bodily kind. he ntiabortion campaigners. No area of contemporary technologJca
The discourse on monsters as a case study highlights a question that t e al pment is more crucial to the construction of gender than the new
seems to me very important for feminist theory: the status of difference technologies. The central link I want to explore
within rational thought. Following the analysis of the philosophical ratio p
between mothers, monsters' and machmes IS therefore my k. argument
suggested by Derrida9 and other contemporary French philosophers, it that contemporary biotechnology displaces women by ma mg procre-
can be argued that Western thought has a logic of binary oppositions ation a high-tech affair.
that treats difference as that which is other-than the accepted norm. The
question then becomes: ca n we free difference from these normative Conjunction 1 : Woman/Mother as Monster
con notations? Can we learn to think differently about difference? 10
The monster is the bodily incarnation of difference from the basic As part of the discursive game of nomadic networking I am [Link]
human norm; it is a deviant, an a-nomaly; it is abnormal. As Georges here, let us start by associating two of these terms: let us supenmoose
Cangui lhem points out, the very notion of the human body rests upon the image of the woman/mother onto that of the body. In
an image that is intrinsically prescriptive: a normally formed human other words, let us take the case study of monsters, deviants, or
being is the zero-degree of monstrosity. Given the special status of the alous entities as being paradigmatic of how
monster, what light does he throw on the structures of scientific dis- within scientific rationality. Why this association of femmmlty With
course? How was the difference of/in the monster perceived within this monstrosity? .
discourse? The association of women with monsters goes as far back Ansto-
When set alongside each other, mothers/monsters/machines may tle who in The Generation of Animals, posits the human norm Jn [Link]
seem puzzling. There is no apparent connection among these three of bodily organization based on a male model. Thus, in reproductiOn,
terms and yet the link soon becomes obvious if I add that recent devel- when everything goes according to the norm a boy is
opments in the field of biotechnology, particularly artificial procreation, female only happens when something goes wrong or fails to occur.m
have extended the power of science over the maternal body of women. the reproductive process. The female is therefore an anomaly, a vana-
The possibility of mechanizing the maternal function is by now well tion on the main theme of man-kind. The [Link] places on
within our reach; the manipulation of life through different combina- the masculinity of the human norm is also reflected m his of con-
tions of genetic engineering has allowed for the creation of new artifi- . . he argues that the principle of life is carriedhexclusively
cept 10n. · by the
t
cial monsters in the high-tech labs of our biochemists. There is therefore sperm, the fema le genital apparatus providing on t e passJve recep a-
a political urgency abou t the future of women in the new reproductive 1 f h man life. The sperm-centered nature of th iSearly theory of pro-
technology debate, which gives a polemical force to my constellation uis thus connected to a massive masculine bias. i.n the general
of ideas- mothers, monsters, and machines. Aristotelian theory of subjectivity. For Aristotle, not surpnsmgly, women
The legal, economic, and political repercussions of the new repro- are not endowed w ith a rational sou 1.11 .
ductive technologies are far-reaching. The recent stand taken by the The topos of women as a sign of abnormality, therefore of dif-
Roman Catholic church and by innumerable "bioethics committees" all ference as a mark of inferiority, remained a constant m Western. SCien-
across Western Europe against experimentation and genetic manipula- tific discourse. This association has produced, among other thmg;;. a
tions may appear fair enough. They all invariably shift the debate, how- style of misogynist literature with which anyone who has read G.u tv-
er's Travels must be familiar: the horror of the female body. The mter-
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS , AND MACH I NES Ill 81
of women as monsters with the literary text is particularly
female body during pregnancy constitutes, in psychoanalytic theory,
s1gn1f1cant and rich in the genre of satire. In a sense, the satirical text is
one of the fundamental axes of fantasy about sexual difference.
implicitly it is a deviant, an aberration in itself. Eminently
transgressive, 1t can afford to express a degree of misogyny that might The appearance of symmetry in the way the two sexes work in repro-
shock in other literary genres. duction merely brings out, however, the separateness and the specificity
of each sexual organization. What looks to the naked eye like a com-
. Outside the. litera;y tradition, however, the association of feminin ity
w1th monstrosity pomts to a system of pejoration that is implicit in the parable pattern: erection/pregnancy, betrays the ineluctable difference.
As psychoanalysis successfully demonstrates, reproduction does not
binary logic of oppositions that characterizes the phallogocentric dis-
encompass the whole of human sexuality and for this reason alone
order. The monstrous as the negative pole, the pole of pejora-
tlon, IS structurally analogous to the feminine as that wh ich is other-than anatomy is not destiny. Moreover, this partial analogy also leads to a
sense of (false) anatom ical complementarity between the sexes that
the established norm, whatever the norm may be. The actual proposi-
contrasts with the complexity of the psychic representations of sexual
tional content of the terms of opposition is less significant for me than
its logic. W ith in this dualistic system, monsters are, just like bodily difference. This double recogn ition of both proxim ity and separation is
the breed ing ground for the rich and varied network of misunderstand-
female subjects, a figure of deva lued difference; as such, it provides the
ings, identifications, interconnections, and mutual demands that is what
fuel for the production of normative discourse. If the position of women
and monsters as logical operators in discu rsive production is compara- sexual human relationships are all about.
ble within the dualistic logic, it follows that the misogyny of discourse Precisely this paradoxical mixture of uthe same and yet other"
is not an irrational exception but rather a tightly constructed system that between the sexes generates a drive to denigrate woman in so far as she
requires difference as pejoration in order to erect the positivity of the is "other-than" the male norm. In this respect hatred for the feminine
norm. In this respect, misogyny is not a hazard but rather the structural constitutes the phallogocentric economy by inducing in both sexes the
necessity of a system that can only represent "otherness" as negativity. desire to ach ieve order, by means of a one-way pattern for both. As long
The theme of woman as deva lued difference remained a constant in as the law of the One is operative, so will be the denigration of the fem-
Western thought; in philosophy especia lly, "she" is forever associated inine, and of women with it. 13
to unholy, disorderly, subhuman, and unsightly phenomena. It is as if Woman as a sign of difference is monstrous. If we define the monster
"she" ca rried w ithin herself something that makes her prone to being an as a bodily entity that is anoma lous and deviant vis-a-vis the norm, then
enemy of mankind, an outsider in her civi lization, an "other." It is we can argue that the female body shares with the monster the privilege
to stress the light that psychoanalytic theory has cast upon of bringing out a unique blend of fascination and horror. Th is logic of
th 1s hatred for the feminine and the trad itional patriarchal association of attraction and repu lsion is extremely significant; psychoanalytic theory
women with monstrosity. takes it as the fundamental structure of the mechan ism of desire and, as
The woman's body can change shape in pregnancy and childbear- such, of the constitution of the neurotiC symptom : the spasm of the hys-
ing;. is therefore capable of defeating the notion of fixed bodily form, teric turns to nausea, displacing itself from its object.
of v1s1ble, recognizable, clear, and distinct shapes as that wh ich marks Jul ia Kristeva, drawing extensively on the research of Mary Douglas,
the contour of the body. She is morphologically dubious. The fact that connects this mixture 14 to the maternal body as the site of the origin of
the female body can change shape so drastically is troublesome in the life and consequently also of the insertion into mortality and death. We
eyes of the logocentric economy within which to see is the primary-act are all of woman born, and the mother's body as the threshold of exis-
of knowledge and the gaze the basis of all epistemic awareness.12 The tence is both sacred and soi led, holy and hellish; it is attractive and
fact that the male sexual organ does, of course, change shape in the lim- repulsive, all-powerfu l and therefore impossible to live with. Kristeva
ti11_1e span of the erection and that th is operation-however precar- speaks of it in terms of "abjection"; the abject arises in that gray, in
IOUS- Is not exactly unrelated to the changes of shape undergone by the between area of the mixed, the ambiguous. The monstrous or deviant is
MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES Ill 83
a figure of abjection in so far as it trespasses and transgresses the barri- foremost of human passions, that which makes everything else possible.
ers between recognizable norms or definitions. Why Western culture did not adopt this way of conceptualizing and
Significantly, the abject approximates the sacred because it appears experiencing difference and opted instead for difference as a sign of
to contain within itself a constitutive ambivalence where life and death negativity remains a critical question for me.
are reconciled. Kristeva emphasizes the dual function of the maternal It is because of this phallogocentric perversion that feminin ity and
site as both life- and death-giver, as object of worship and of terror. The monstrosity can be seen as isomorphic. Woman/mother is monstrous by
notion of the sacred is generated precisely by th is blend of fascination excess; she transcends established norms and transgresses boundaries.
and horror, wh ich prompts an intense play of the imaginary, of fantasies She is monstrous by lack: woman/mother does not possess the substan-
and often nightmares about the ever-shifting boundaries between life tive unity of the masculine subject. Most important, through her identi-
and death, night and day, masculine and feminine, active and passive, fication with the feminine she is monstrous by displacement: as sign of
and so forth. the in between areas, of the indefinite, the ambiguous, the mixed,
In a remarkable essay about the head of the Medusa, Freud connect- woman/mother is subjected to a constant process of metaphorization as
ed this logic of attraction and repulsion to the sight of female genitalia; "other-than."
because there is nothing to see in that dark and mysterious region, the In the binary structure of the logocentric system, "woman," as the
imagination goes haywire. Short of losing his head, the male gazer is eterna l pole of opposition, the "other", can be assigned to the most var-
certa inly struck by castration anx iety. For fear of losing the thread of his ied and often contradictory terms. The on ly constant remains her
thought, Freud then turns his distress into the most overdetermined of "becom ing-metaphor," whether of the sacred or the profane, of heaven
all questions: "what does woman want?" or hell, of life or death. "Woman" is that which is assigned and has no
A post-Freudian reading of this text permits us to see how the ques- power of self-definition. "Woman" is the anomaly that confirms the pos-
tion about female desire emerges out of male anxiety about the repre- itivity of the norm.
sentation of sexual difference. In a more Lacanian vein, Kristeva adds an
important insight: the female sex as the site of origin also inspires awe Conjunction 2: Teratology and the Feminine
because of the psychic and cultural imperative to separate from the
mother and accept the Law of the Father. The incest taboo, the funda- The history of teratology, or the science of monsters, demonstrates
mental law of our social system, builds on the mixture of fascination and clearly the ways in which the body in general and the female body in
horror that characterizes the feminine/materna l object of abjection. As particu lar have been conceptualized in W estern scientiric discourse,
the site of primary repression, and therefore that which escapes from progressing from the fantastic dimension of the bodily organ ism to a
representation, the mother's body becomes a turbulent area of psychic more rationalistic construction of the body-machine. The monster as a
life. human being born with congenital malformations undergoes a series of
Obviously, this analysis merely describes the mechanisms at work in successive representations historically, before it gives rise, in the latter
our cultural system; no absolute necessity surrounds the symbolic part of the eighteenth century, to an acceptable, scientific discourse.
absence of Woman. On the contrary, feminists have been working pre- The work of French epistemologist and philosopher of science
cisely to put into images that which escapes phallogocentric modes of Georges Canguilhem and of his disciple Michel Foucault is extremely
representation. Thus, in her critique of psychoanalysis, Luce lrigaray useful in studying the modes of interaction of the norma l and the patho-
points out that the dark continent of all dark continents is the mother- logical, the normative and the transgressive in Western philosophy. For
daughter relationship. She also suggests that, instead of this logic of Canguilhem, the stakes in theory of monstrosity are the questions of
attraction and repulsion, sexual difference may be thought out in terms reproduction, of origins: "how can such monstrous creatures be con-
of recognition and wonder. The latter is one of the fundamental pas- ceived?" The conception of monsters is what really haunts the scientific
sions in Descartes' treatise about human affectivity: he values it as the imagination. Whereas psychoanalysts like Lacan and lrigaray argue that
the epistem(ophil)ic question of the origin lies at the heart of all scien-
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES Ill 85
tific investigation, Cangui lhem is interested in providing the historical We can make a further distinction between the baroque and enlight-
perspective on how the scientific discourse about monsters emerged. d or "scientific" discourses on monsters. In the sixteenth and seven-
He argues that teratology became constituted as a discipline when it centuries, the monster stil l possesses the classical sense of some-
required the conceptual and technological means of mastering the thing wonderful, fantastic, rare, and precious. Just like madman, the
pro/reproduction of monsters. In other words, the scientific and techno- dwarf and other marvels, it participates in the life of town and
logical know-how necessary for the artificial reproduction of human ·oys certain privileges. For instance, dwarves as court Jesters and
anomalies is the precondition for the establishment of a scientific disci- fools can transgress social conventions, can say and d o t h"mgs t hat " nor-
enJ
pline concerned with abnormal beings. mal" human beings cannot afford to say or do.
This means that on the discursive level, the monster points out the The imagination of the times runs wild as to the origins of monsters
major epistemological function played by anomalies, abnormalities, as objects of horror and fascination, as someth ing both and
and pathology in the consti tution of biological sciences. Historically, ominous. The question of the origins of monsters accompames the
biologists have privileged phenomena that deviate from the norm, in development of the medical sciences in the prescientific imagination; it
order to exemplify the normal structure of development. In this respect conveys an interesting mixture of traditional superstitions and elements
the study of monstrous births is a forerunner of modern embryology. of reflection that wil l lead to a more scientific method of enqui ry. Out
Biologists have set up abnorma l cases in order to elucidate normal of the mass of documentary evidence on this point, I wi ll concentrate
behavior; psychoana lysis will follow exactly the same logic for mental on one aspect that throws light on my question about the connection
disorders. The proximity of the normal and the pathological demon- between monstrosity and the feminine. Ambroise Pare's treatise15 on
strates the point Foucault made in relation to madness and reason: sci- wondrous beings lists among the causes for their conception various
entific rationality is implicitly normative, it functions by exclusion and forms of unnatural copulation ranging from bestiality to everyday forms
disqualification accord ing to a dualistic logic. of immorality, such as having sexual intercourse too often, or on a Sun-
The history of discourse about monsters conventionally falls into day night (sic), or on the night of any major religious holiday. As a mat-
three chronological periods. In the first, the Greeks and Romans main- ter of fact, all sexual practices other than those leading to healthy repro-
tained a notion of a "race" of monsters, an ethnic entity possessing spe- duction are suspected to be conducive to monstrous events. Food can
cific characteristics. They also relied on the notion of "abjection," see- also play a major role; the regulation of diet is extremely important and
ing the monster not only as the sign of marvel but also of disorder and implicitly connected to religious regulations concerning time, season
divine wrath. The practice of exposing monstrous children as unnatural and cycles of life. 16
creatures was inaugurated by the Greeks. Thus Oedipus himself- Bad weather can adversely affect procreation, as can an excess or a
"swollen foot" -was not "normal," and his destruction should have lack of semen; the devil also plays an important role, and he definitely
been in the order of things. interferes with normal human reproduction. Well may we laugh at such
More generally, classical mythology represents no founding hero, no beliefs; many still circulate in rural areas of Western Europe. Besides,
main divine creature or demigod as being of woman born. In fact, one the whole fantastic discourse about the origins of monsters becomes
or the constant themes in the making of a god is his "unnatural" birth: considerably Jess amusing when we consider that women paid a heavy
his ability, through subterfuges such as immaculate conceptions and price for these wild notions. The history of women's relationship to "the
other tricks, to short-ci rcuit the orifice through which most humans devi l" in Western Europe is a history too full of horrors for us to take
beings pop into the spatia-temporal rea lm of existence. The fantastic - these notions lightly.
dimension of classical mythological discourse about monsters il lus- It is not surprising, therefore, that the baroque mind gave a major role
trates the paradox of aberration and adoration that I mentioned earl ier to the maternal imagination in procreation generall y and in the con-
and it therefore inscribes an antimaterna l dimension at the very heart of ception of monsters particularlyY The mother was said to have the
the matter.
actual power of producing a monstrous baby simply by: (a) thinking
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES I ll 87
about awful things during intercourse (it's the close-your-eyes-and- gurated a flight from the female body in a desire to master the woman's
think-of-England principle); (b) dreaming very intensely about some- generative powers. . .. .
thing or somebody; or (c) looking at animals or evil-looking creatures Very often feminist scholars have taken this pornt as a CritiCISm of
18
(this is the Xerox-machine complex: if a woman looked at a dog, for I ssical rationalism, especially in the Cartesian form, far too provoca-
ca
· ly The feminist line has been "I th1nk . there fore he .IS,"h
t us emp ha-
instance, with a certain look in her eyes, then she would have the power
tlve . k · h'
of transmitting that image to the fetus and reproducing it exactly, thus sizing the male-centered view of human nature that is at wor rn t IS
creating a dog-faced baby). discourse. Whatever Descartes' responsibility for the flight from wom-
I let you imagine the intense emotion that struck a village in North- anhood may be-and I maintain that it should be carefully assessed-
ern France in the seventeenth century when a baby was born who for the purpose of my research what matters is the particular form that
looked remarkably like the local bishop. The woman defended herself this flight took in the seventeenth century. ·
by claiming gazing rights: she argued that she had stared at the male
character in chu rch with such intense devotion that ... she xeroxed him Conjunction 3: The Fantasy of
away! She saved her life and proved the femin ist theory that female gaze Male-Born Children
as the expression of female desire is always perceived as a dangerous,
if not dead ly, thing. The flight from and rejection of the feminine can also be analyzed
a different angle: the history of the biological sciences in the presCien-
In other words, the mother's imagination is as strong as the force of
tific era, especially the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. I argue that
nature; in order to assess this, one needs to appreciate the specia l role
the flight from the fem inine, and particularly from the monstrous po':er
that the imagination plays in the seventeenth century theories of knowl-
of the maternal imagination and desire, lies at the heart of the recurnng
edge. It is a fundamental element in the classical worldview, and yet it
fantasy of a child born from man alone.
is caught in great ambiva lence: the imagination is the capacity to draw
We find, for instance, alchemists busy at work to try to produce the
connections and consequently to construct ideas and yet it is potentially
anti rational. phi losopher's son-the homunculus, a man-made tiny man P?pping
out of the alchemists' laboratories, fully formed and endowed w1th lan-
The Cartesian Meditations are the clearest example of this ambivalence,
guage. The alchemists' imagination pushes the premises of the Ari:-
which we find projected massively onto the power of the mother. She can
totelian view of procreation to an extreme, stressing the male role rn
direct the fetus to normal development or she can de-form it, un-do it,
reproduction and minimizing the female function to the role of a mere
de-humanize it.
carrier. Alchemy is a reductio ad absurdum of the male fantasy of self-
It is as if the mother, as a desiring agent, has the power to undo the
reproduction.
work of legitimate procreation through the sheer force of her imagina-
How can a child be of man born? In a recent article, S. G. Allen and
tion. By deforming the product of the father, she cancels what psycho-
j. Hubbs19 argue that alchemical symbolism rests on a simple process-
analytic theory calls "the Name-of-the-Father." The female "signature"
the appropriation of the womb by ma le "art," that is to say the
of the reproductive pact is unholy, inhuman, illegitimate, and it remains
of male techniques. Paracelsus, the master theoretician of alchemy, 1s
the mere pre-text to horrors to come. Isn' t the product of woman's cre- certa in that a man should and could be born outside a woman's body.
ativity always so?
Womb envy, alias the envy for the matrix or the uterus, reaches para-
This bel ief is astonish ing however, when it is contextualized histori- doxical dimensions in these texts-art being more powerfu l than nature
cally: consider that the debate between the Aristotel ian theory of con-
itself.
ception, with its sperm-centered view of th ings, and mother-centered The recipe is quite simple, as any reader of Tristram Shandy will
notions of procreation, has a long history. The seventeenth centu ry know. It consists of a mixture of sperm and something to replace the
seems to have reached a paroxysm of hatred for the feminine; it inau- uterus, such as the alchemist's jars and other containers so efficiently
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES Ill 89
described in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. At other times the matrix is sciences occupy a very significant place in the discursive context of
replaced by an ox-hide, or by a mere heap of compost or manure. The modernity.
basic assumption is that the alchemists can not only imitate the work of Two institutions of learning appear in the modern era-the clinic and
woman, they can also do it much better because the artifact, the artifi- the hospital. The appearance of these structures is in turn related to a
cial process of science and technique, perfects the imperfection of the major theoretical breakthrough-the medical practice of anatomy. In
natural course of events and thus avoids mistakes. Once reproduction Foucault's archaeological mode, for comparative clinical anatomy to
becomes the pure result of mental efforts, the appropriation of the fem- come into being as a scientific discourse, a century-old taboo had to be
inine is complete. lifted, the one that forbade the dissection of corpses for the purpose of
On the imaginary level, therefore, the test-tube babies of today mark scientific investigation.
the long-term triumph of the alchemists' dream of dominating nature Western culture had respected a fundamental taboo of the body up
through their self-inseminating, masturbatory practices. What is hap- unti l then-the med ical gaze cou ld not explore the inside of the human
pening with the new reproductive technologies today is the final chap- body because the bod ily container was considered as a metaphysical
ter in a long history of fantasy of self-generation by and for the men entity, marked by the secrets of life and death that pertain to the divine
of science, but men of the male kind, capable of pro- being. The anatomica l study of the body was therefore forbidden until
ducrng new monsters and fascinated by their power. the fifteenth century and after then was strictly controlled. The nine-
Ever since the mid nineteenth century, the abnormal monstrous teenth century sprang open the doors of bodi ly perception; cl in ical
beings, which had been objects of wonder, have fallen prey to the mas- anatomy thus implies a radical transformation in the epistemological
[Link] of scientific discourse. The marvelous, imaginary status of the body. It is a practice that consists in deciphering the body,
d1mens10n of the monster is forgotten in the light of the new technolo- transforming the organism into a text to be read and interpreted by a
gies the body. Michel Foucault's analysis of modern rationality knowledgeable medical gaze.
descnbes the fundamental shift that has taken place in scientific dis- Anatomy as a theoretical representation of the body implies that the
course of the modern era. latter is a clear and distinct configuration, a visible and intelligible struc-
By the late eighteenth century, the monster has been transferred to ture. The dead body, the corpse, becomes the measure of the living
or to the newly established institution of the anatomy being, and death thus becomes one of the factors epistemologically
clrn1c, where 1t could be analyzed in the context of the newly evolved integrated into scientific knowledge.
practice of comparative anatomy and experimental biomedicine. Thus Today, the right to scrutinize the inside of the body for scientific pur-
is born the science of teratology. Founded by G. Saint-Hilaire, by the poses is taken for granted, although dissections and the transferal of
end of the century it had become an experimental science. Its aim was organs as a practice are strictly regulated by law. As a matter of fact,
to stud.y malformations of the embryo so as to understand in the light of contemporary molecular biology is making visible the most intimate
evolutiOnary theory the genesis of monstrous beings. Notice that the ini- and minute fires of life.
tial curiosity as to the origin of such horrendous creatures remains but Where has the Cartesian passion of wonder gone? When compared
it is expressed differently. ' to the earlier trad ition, the medicalization of the body in the age of
experimental study of the conditions that wou ld lead to the pro- modernity and its corollary, the perfectibil ity of the living organ ism and
duction of anoma lous or monstrous beings provides the basic episte- the gradual abolition of anomalies, can also be seen-though not exclu -
mological structure of modern embryology. Foucault's analysis of sively- as a form of denial of the sense of wonder, of the fantastic, of
modernity emphasizes the epistemological shifts between the normal that mixture of fascination and horror I have already mentioned. It
the pathological, reason and madness, in terms of the understand- marks the loss of fascination about the living organism, its mysteries and
rng of the body, the bodily roots of human subjectivity. The biomedical functions.
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES
Ill 91
Psychoanalytic theory has explained this loss of fascination as the duced-even a technique such as echography perpetuates this porno-
necessary toll that rational theory takes on human understanding. In the graphic re-presentation of bodi ly parts, externalizing the interior of the
psychoanalytic perspective, of Freudian and Lacanian inspiration, the womb and its content.
initial curiosity that prompts the drive and the wi ll to know is first and The prol iferation of images is such that the very notion of the body,
foremost desire, which takes knowledge as its object. of its boundaries and its inner structure is being split open in an ever-
The desire to know is, like all desires, related to the problem of rep- regressing vision. We seem to be hell bent on xeroxing even the invisi-
resenting one's origin, of answering the most childish and consequent- ble particles of matter.
ly fundamental of questions: "where did I come from?" This curiosity, as Philosophers of science, such as Kuhn and Fayarabend, have stressed
I stated in the previous chapter, is the matrix for all forms of thinking and the modern predicament in scientific discourse. Kuhn points out the
conceptualization. Knowledge is always the desire to know about paradoxica l coincidence of extreme rationali sm of the scientific and
desire, that is to say about things of the body as a sexual entity. technological kind, w ith a persisting subtext of wi ld fantastic concoc-
Scientific knowledge becomes, in this perspective, an extremely per- tions. In the discourse of monstrosity, rational enquiries about their ori-
verted version of that original question. The desire to go and see how gin and structure continue to coexist with superstitious beliefs and fic-
things work is related to primitive sadistic drives, so that, somewhere tiona l representations of "creeps." The two registers of the rationa l and
along the line, the scientist is like the anxious little child who pu lls apart the totally nonrational seem to run alongside each other, never quite
his favorite toy to see how it's made inside. Knowing in this mode is the joined together.
result of the scopophi lic drive-to go and see, and the sadistic one- to The question nevertheless rema ins- where has the wonder gone?
rip it apart physically so as to master it intellectually. All this is related What has happened to the fantastic dimension, to the horror and the
to the incestuous drive, to the web of curiosity and taboos surround ing fascination of difference? What images were created of the bod ily marks
the one site of certain origin- the mother's body. of difference, aher they became locked up in the electron ic laboratories
From a psychoana lytic perspective the establishment of clinical com- of the modern alchem ists?
parative anatomy in the modern era is very sign ificant because it points Was there another way, other than the phallogocentric incompe-
out the rationalistic obsession with visibility, which I have ana lyzed ear- tence w ith, and antipathy to, differences-its willfu l reduction of other-
lier. Seeing is the prototype of knowing. By elaborat ing a scientific tech- ness, to negativity? Is there another way out, still?
nique for analyzing the bodily organs, Western sciences put forward the
assumption that a body is precisely that wh ich can be seen and looked Conjunction 4 : The Age of Freaks
at, no more than the sum of its parts. Modern scientific rationality
sl ipped from the emphasis on visibility to the mirage of absolute trans- As the Latin etymology of the term monstrum points out, malformed
parence of the living organism, as I have argued previously. human beings have always been the object of display, subjected to the
Contemporary biological sciences, particularly molecular biology, public gaze. In his classic study, Freaks, Leslie Fiedler20 analyses the
have pushed to the extreme these assumptions that were implicit in the exploitation of monsters for purposes of enterta inment. From the coun-
discou rse of Western sciences. When compared to the cl inical anatomy ty fairs, right across rura l Europe to the Coney Island sideshows, freaks
of the nineteenth century, contemporary biomedica l sciences have have always been enterta ining.
acqui red the right and the know-how necessary to act on the very struc- Both Fied ler and Bogdan 21 stress two interrelated aspects of the dis-
tu re of the living matter, on an infin itely small sca le. play of freaks since the turn of the century. The first is that their exhibi-
Foucau lt defined the modern era as that of biopower; power over life tion displays rac ist and orientalist undertones: abnormally formed peo-
and death in a worldwide extension of man's control of outer space, of ple were exh ibited alongside tribal people of normal statu re and bod ily
the bottom of the oceans as well as of the depths of the maternal body. configuration, as well as exotic an imals.
There are no limits today for what can be shown, photographed, repro- Second, the med ical profession benefited considerably by exam ining
these human exhibits. Although the freak is presented as belonging to
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES Ill 93
the realm of zoology or anthropology, doctors and physicians examined capped political movement, thereby claiming not only a renewed sense
them regularly and wrote scientific reports about them. of dignity but also wider social and political rights. 22
Significantly, totalitarian regimes such as Hitler's Germany or the
Stalinist Soviet _Union prohibited the exhibition of freaks as being In Transit; or, For Nomadism
degenerate spec1mens of the human species. They also dealt with them
their campaigns for eugenics and race or ethnic hygiene, by prevent- Mothers, monsters, and machines. What is the connection, then? What
mg them from breeding. con/dis-junctions can we make in telling the tale of feminism, science,
Fiedler sees a connection between the twentieth-century medical- and technology? How do feminist fabulations or figurations help in fig-
ization of monsters, the scientific appropriation of their generative uring out alternative paradigms? To what extent do they speak the lan-
secrets, and an increased commodification of the monster as freak that guage of sexual difference? Where do we situate ourselves in order to
is, the object of display. ' create links, construct theories, elaborate hypotheses? Which way do
Contemporary cu lture deals with anomalies by a fascination for the we look to try and see the possible impact modern science will have on
freaky. The film Freaks by Tod Brown ing (1932) warns us that monsters the status of women? How do we assess the status of difference as an
are an endangered species. Since the sixties a whole youth culture has ontological category at the end of the twentieth century? How do we
developed around freaks, with special emphasis on genetic mutation as think about all this?
a sign of nonconformism and socia l rebellion. Whole popular culture The term transdisciplinary can describe one position taken by femi-
genres such as science fiction, horror, rock'n'roll comics, and cyber- nists. Passing in between different discursive fields, and through diverse
punk are about mutants. spheres of intellectual discourse. The femin ist theoretician today can
Today, the freaks are science fiction androids, cyborgs, bionic only be "in transit," moving on, passing through, creating connections
women and men, comparable to the grotesque of former times; the where things were previously dis-connected or seemed un-related,
whole rock'n'roll scene is a huge theater of the grotesque, combining where there seemed to be "nothing to see." In transit, moving, dis-plac-
freaks, androgynes, satanies, ugliness, and insanity, as well as violence. ing-this is the grain of hysteria without which there is no theorization
In other words, in the early part of our century we watch the simul- at al1. 23 In a feminist context it also implies the effort to move on to the
taneous formalization of a scientific discourse about monsters and their invention of new ways of relating, of building footbridges between
elimination as a problem. This process, which falls under the rationalist notions. The epistemic nomadism I am advocating can only work, in
aggressi?n of scientific discourse, also operates a shift at the level of rep- fact, if it is properly situated, securely anchored in the "in between"
resentation, and of the cultural imaginary. The dimension of the "fan- zones.
tast_ic," that mixtu_re of aberration and adoration, loathing and attraction, I am assuming here a definition of "rigor" away from the linear Aris-
centunes has escorted the existence of strange and difficult totelian logic that dominated it for so long. It seems to me that the rigor
bod1es, IS now displaced. The "becoming freaks" of monsters both feminists are after is of a different kind- it is the rigor of a project that
deflates the fantastic projections that have surrounded them and emphasizes the necessary interconnection-connections between the
expands them to a wider cultural field. The whole of contemporary pop- theoretical and the political, which insists on putting real-life experi-
culture is about freaks, just as the last of the physical freaks have ence fi rst and foremost as a criterion for the va lidation of truth. It is the
disappeared. The last metaphorica l shift in the status of monsters-their rigor of passionate investment in a project and in the quest of the dis-
becoming freaks-coincides w ith their elimination. cursive means to realize it.
In order not to be too pessimistic about th is aspect of the problem In this respect feminism acts as a rem inder that in the postmodern
however, I wish to point out that the age of the commodification of predicament, rationality in its classical mode can no longer be taken as
freaks is also the period that has resulted in another significant shift: representing the totality of human reason or even of the all-too-human
abnorma ll y formed people have organized themselves in the handi- activity of thinking.
 MOTHERS, MONSTERS, AND MACHINES
FO UR
By criticizing the single-mindedness and the masculine bias of ratio-
nality I do not intend to fall into the opposite and plead for easy ready-
made irrationalism. Patriarchal thought has for too long confined
Re-figu ri ng the Subject
women in the irrational for me to claim such a non-quality. What we
need instead is a redefinition of what we have learned to recognize as
There are no fragments where there is no whole.
being the structure and the aims of human subjectivity in its relationship
-Martha Rosier, Decade Show,
to difference, to the "other."
New York City, 1990
In claiming that feminists are attempting to redefine the very mean-
ing of thought, I am also suggesting that in time the rules of the discur-
sive game will have to change. Academics will have to agree that think-
ing adequately about our historical condition implies the transcendence
of disciplinary boundaries and intellectual categories.
More important, for feminist epistemologists, the task of thinking
adequately about the historical cond itions that affect the medicalization
of the maternal function forces upon us the need to reconsider the inex-
The Postmetaphysical Cond ition
tricable interconnection of the bodily with the technologica l. The sh ifts The era commonly referred to as ''modernity," "modernization," or
that have taken place in the perception and the representation of the "modernism" (despite the different implications and nuances of each of
embodied subject, in fact, make it imperative to think the unity of body these terms) is marked by the changi ng socioeconomic and discursive
and machine, flesh and metal. Although many factors point to the dan- conditions in the status of all minorities, especially women. For a num-
ger of commodification of the body that such a mixture makes possible, ber of reasons that I have analyzed elsewhere, 1 the emancipation of
and although this process of commod ification conceals racist and sex- women and their integration into not only the labor force but also into
ist dangers that must not be underestimated, this is not the whole story. an intellectual and political life, has become a pressing necessity in the
There is also a positive side to the new interconnection of mothers, Western world. The first paradox to explore in a discussion between
monsters, and machines, and th is has to do with the loss of any essen- modern ity and the femin ist quest is therefore that of a historica l period
tia lized definition of womanhood-or indeed even of motherhood. In that needs to integrate women socially, economically, and politically,
the age of biotechnological power motherhood is split open into a vari- thus reversing the traditional patterns of exclusion and oppression of
ety of possible physiologica l, cultura l, and social functions. If this were women .
the best of all possible worlds, one could celebrate the decline of one In this chapter I will adopt a more theoretical approach to this ques-
consensual way of experiencing motherhood as a sign of increased free- tion. I will argue that in this new context the women's movement has
dom for women. Our world being as male-dominated as it is, however, placed on the agenda serious questions as to the structures, the values,
the best option is to construct a nomadic style of feminism that will and the theoretical foundations of the very system that women, like
allow women to rethink their position in a postindustrial, postmeta- other minorities, are urged to integrate. The leading line of questioning
physical world, without nostalgia, paranoia, or fa lse sentimentalism. is both ethico-political and epistemologica l: what is the exact price to
The relevance and political urgency of the configuration "mothers, be paid for "integration"? What values shall fem inist women propose to
monsters and mach ines" makes it all the more urgent for the feminist - the old system? What representations of themselves will they oppose to
nomadic thinkers of the world to connect and to negotiate new bound- those already established? One can read the whole of contemporary
aries for female identity in a world where power over the body has Western feminism, as well as related and equally complex cultural and
reached an implosive peak. political phenomena, such as women's modernist literature, 2 in the light
of this line of questioning.