My apologies for this being late.
I struggled with the term “natureculture”. Its weird because when she says”technoculture” I feel like I completely get what she means, but”natureculture” throws my brain for a loop. On page 8 she talks about howMarilyn Strathern says that “nature” and “culture” should not be thought ofas polar opposites: “Finally, Marilyn Strathern…taught us why conceivingof “nature” and “culture” as either polar opposites or universal categoriesis foolish.” So maybe Harroway is using natureculture to talk about howhumans are not separate from nature, as is sometimes conceived? And ourconnectedness with nature has something to do with our relationship withcompanion animals? I’d like to get more clarity on this.
On page 15 I was struck by the quote: “Post-Cyborg, what counts asbiological kind troubles previous categories of organism. The mechanic andthe textual are internal to the organic and vice versa in irreversibleways.” My brain immediately leapt to thinking about virtual creatures —Aibos, Furbies, Tamogatchies, etc. and wondering if they counted as species. From there I started wondering about the proliferation of virtual pets andwhat that proliferation says about the nature of humanity? Do we just havean inexhaustible craving for nurturing? Or love (either to be loved or tolove)? And does this relate back to our real pets too? Why IS IT thathuman beings seek out the company of other animals to the extent that we do,and why are virtual animals adequate surrogates in some instances? What doesthat say about what qualities we are seeking to get from live animals?
The quote that straddles page 16 & 17 seems critical, but I struggled withit. “I want to convince my readers that inhabitants of technoculture becomewho we are in the symbiogenetic tissues of naturecultures, in story and infact.” People steeped in life with technology become that way due to ourdeeply rooted drive for symbiosis, which is part of our integration withnature… This is as far as I could get. I couldn’t completely “unpack” it.
A thread that runs throughout the whole chapter is this theme of acombination of material/semiotic, sign/flesh, story/fact. This seems key tothe idea of naturecultures: “Flesh and Signifier, bodies and words, storiesand worlds: these are joined in naturecultures.” It is resisting myattempts to sort it out however.
Also, I like the word “Metaplasm”. “Metaplasm means a change in a word, forexample by adding, omitting, inverting, or transposing its letters,syllables or sounds.”(Harroway, 20)