Table Of ContentTECHNOLOGIES OF THE NEW REAL
Viral Contagion and Death of the Social
With astonishing speed, we have been projected into a new reality where
interactions with drones, robotic bodies, and high-level surveillance are
increasingly mainstream. In this age of groundbreaking developments
in robotic technologies, synthetic biology is merging with artificial intel-
ligence, forming a newly blended reality of machines, bodies, and affect.
Technologies of the New Real draws from critical intersections of technol-
ogy and society – including drones, surveillance, DIY bodies, and innova-
tions in robotic technology – to explore what these advances can tell us
about our present reality, or what authors Arthur and Marilouise Kroker
deem the “new real” of digital culture in the twenty-first century.
Technologies of the New Real explores the many technologies of our pres-
ent reality as they infiltrate the social, political, and economic static of
our everyday lives, seemingly eroding traditionally conceived boundaries
between humans and machines, and rendering fully ambivalent borders
between the human mind and simulated data.
arthur kroker is an emeritus professor and adjunct professor of polit-
ical science at the University of Victoria. He is the director of the Pacific
Centre for Technology and Culture (PACTAC).
marilouise kroker was a feminist scholar, publisher, editor, writer, the-
orist, and performance artist.
DIGITAL FUTURES
Series Editor: ARTHUR KROKER, University of Victoria
Digital Futures is a series of critical examinations of technological devel-
opment and the transformation of contemporary society by technol-
ogy. The concerns of the series are framed by the broader traditions
of literature, humanities, politics, and the arts. Focusing on the ethical,
political, and cultural implications of emergent technologies, the series
looks at the future of technology through the “digital eye” of the writer,
new media artist, political theorist, social thinker, cultural historian,
and humanities scholar. The series invites contributions to understand-
ing the political and cultural context of contemporary technology and
encourages ongoing creative conversations on the destiny of the wired
world in all of its utopian promise and real perils.
Editorial Advisory Board
David Cook, University of Toronto
Ronald Deibert, University of Toronto
Christopher Dewdney, York University
Sara Diamond, Ontario College of Art & Design University
Ricardo Dominguez, University of California, San Diego
Nichola Feldman-Kiss, Toronto
Renate Ferro, Cornell University
Anita Girvan, Athabasca University
Johnny Golding, Royal College of Art, London
Ted Hiebert, University of Washington, Bothell
Jessica Kolopenuk, University of Alberta
Pierre Lévy, University of Ottawa
Jackson Leween, 2bears, University of Lethbridge
Lev Manovich, Graduate Center, CUNY
Liam Mitchell, Trent University
Timothy Murray, Cornell University
Marcos Novak, University of California, Santa Barbara
Stephen Pfohl, Boston College
Avital Ronell, New York University
Jentery Sayers, University of Victoria
Allucquére Rosanne (Sandy) Stone, University of Texas, Austin
For a list of books published in this series, see page 190.
Technologies of the New Real
Viral Contagion and Death of the Social
ARTHUR KROKER AND MARILOUISE KROKER
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buffalo London
© University of Toronto Press 2022
Toronto Buffalo London
utorontopress.com
Printed in the U.S.A.
ISBN 978-1-4875-4021-0 (cloth) ISBN 978-1-4875-4024-1 (EPUB)
ISBN 978-1-4875-4022-7 (paper) ISBN 978-1-4875-4023-4 (PDF)
Digital Futures
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: Technologies of the new real : viral contagion and death of the social /
Arthur Kroker and Marilouise Kroker.
Names: Kroker, Arthur, 1945–, author. | Kroker, Marilouise, author.
Series: Digital futures.
Description: Series statement: Digital futures | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210278757 | Canadiana (ebook) 2021027879X |
ISBN 9781487540210 (cloth) | ISBN 9781487540227 (paper) |
ISBN 9781487540241 (EPUB) | ISBN 9781487540234 (PDF)
Subjects: LCSH: Technology – Social aspects. | LCSH: Technology – Political
aspects. | LCSH: Technology – Economic aspects.
Classification: LCC T14.5 .K76 2022 | DDC 303.48/3 – dc23
This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Federation
for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly
Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and
Humanities Research Council of Canada.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its
publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts
Council, an agency of the Government of Ontario.
Dedicated to the memory of Marilouise Kroker, 1943–2018, writer, editor,
poet of the spoken word, artist of the unspoken image, feminist theorist
of bodies disavowed, prohibited, excluded, intellectual visionary of the
digital future with its codes of domination and uncoded territories of
resistance, imagination, and solidarity; and to our granddaughters,
Claire and Lilith, who represent so well the brilliant promise of the rising
generation of the young
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Viral Contagion and Death of the Social 3
1 DIY Bodies 27
2 Power under Surveillance, Capitalism under Suspicion 53
3 Dreaming with Drones 98
4 Robots Trekking across the Uncanny Valley 123
Epilogue: From the Insurgence of the Blended Mind to Gen Z 149
Notes 173
Index 185
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Acknowledgments
Technologies of the New Real was begun in creative collaboration with
Marilouise Kroker, who not only had superb insights concerning the
fatal trajectory traced by contemporary technological innovations, in-
cluding DIY bodies, surveillance practice, drones hunting humans, and
robots in the age of artificial intelligence but also expressed her insights
in both the writing of the different chapters as well as by brilliant poetry,
including “Lip-Synching the Future,” “Terror from Above,” and “Night
Sky Epilogue.” While Marilouise did not live to experience the contem-
porary pandemic fever that is viral contagion and the death of the social,
the power of her critical intellectuality touches every page of this book.
It turns out that the intense collaboration that we shared over almost five
decades, in writing, editing, performance, and publishing, definitely did
not end with death, but very much continues with a form of writing that
remains true to a deeply shared intellectual sensibility. Life may find its
limits in the finitude of the body, but consciousness has a way of begin-
ning anew in the limitlessness of the collaborative imagination, just that
point where love, care for the other, and critical engagement with the
world always finds ways of expressing itself.
I am grateful to the following people who have given me permission
to use their material in the writing of this book: Dr. Deena Weinstein
for permission to publish lyrics to “God Won’t Bless America” and other
quotes from Michael A. Weinstein’s contributions to the music and
manifesto of Vortis, a Chicago punk rock band of which he was both
lead singer and theorist of the Vorticist imaginary; Craig Fahner for
permission to publish excerpts from his insightful contribution to the
online discussion of dystopia in the superb listserv, -empyre- soft-skinned
space (https://empyre.library.cornell.edu/); Robyn Smith, editor, The
Tyee (thetyee.ca) and Mitchel Anderson, author, “Humans Need a Prime
Directive, Fast,” thetyee.ca, 7 December 2008.
