Paper Title
Ex Machina: A Dark Fable About Intersectionality
Location
Room 220, DiGiorgio Campus Center (DiGs)
Keywords
Artificial Intelligence, Intersectionality, Ex Machina, Frankenstein
Start Date
April 2016
End Date
April 2016
Abstract
Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2015), a recent entry in the genre of dystopic AI films, is read by many critics as an AI “upgrade” on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Like Frankenstein, Garland’s Ex Machina is another tale of excessive hubris of an inventor/physician who violates the proper natural bounds of human endeavor, thus reaping a tragic outcome, both for creator and his creation. There certainly are parallels, but Ex Machina is something else, or perhaps something in addition: a study of intersectionality as underestimated power. Tales of intersectional experience in our society are often tales of powerlessness in the face of abusive social practices. Ex Machina, it will be argued, is the opposite — an illustration of how a socially cultivated disposition dismissive of intersectional significance can be used against intersectionally oblivious oppressors. It’s not entirely clear how the film invites us to view this development, but it’s certainly a way to invite audiences to take lived intersectional experience more seriously.
Ex Machina: A Dark Fable About Intersectionality
Room 220, DiGiorgio Campus Center (DiGs)
Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2015), a recent entry in the genre of dystopic AI films, is read by many critics as an AI “upgrade” on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Like Frankenstein, Garland’s Ex Machina is another tale of excessive hubris of an inventor/physician who violates the proper natural bounds of human endeavor, thus reaping a tragic outcome, both for creator and his creation. There certainly are parallels, but Ex Machina is something else, or perhaps something in addition: a study of intersectionality as underestimated power. Tales of intersectional experience in our society are often tales of powerlessness in the face of abusive social practices. Ex Machina, it will be argued, is the opposite — an illustration of how a socially cultivated disposition dismissive of intersectional significance can be used against intersectionally oblivious oppressors. It’s not entirely clear how the film invites us to view this development, but it’s certainly a way to invite audiences to take lived intersectional experience more seriously.
