March 18th: Neuromancer (1984) Day 2 of 2

Submit your 9-page draft of your Social Construction of Technology essay on Canvas before 5pm!

**William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984)**

To get us started, let’s consider some instances early in the novel that set the stage for understanding reality…or misunderstanding reality.

Case broken and wasting away on skid row–Night City

Case is an addict and paranoid: “The cultivation of a certain tame paranoia was something Case took for granted. The trick lay in not letting it get out of control” (p. 14).
- “Just because you’re paranoid / Don’t mean they’re not after you”–Nirvana “Territorial Pissings”
- Interestingly, that song starts out “When I was an Alien / Cultures weren’t opinions.” Care to comment?
- ~~Where else has paranoia–specifically, the idea that some paranoia is normal–come up in our reading?~~ (Different class’s topic, but, if you read Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, you’d know…)
Case assumes the fences (people who sell stolen goods), pimps, and corporate assassins are after him, so he rents a gun from Shin (p. 14). We later find out Molly was following him: “I showed up and you just fit me right into your reality picture” (p. 24).
Case is suicidal based on Armitage’s computer profile (pp. 28-29).
- Perhaps some Freudian analysis of the death drive might be of interest.

Deal to renew himself and be whole again

Main plot motivation: Case has hit bottom, but can redeem himself and get a new body and have [everlasting] life jacking into the Matrix, cyberspace?
- Definitely some allusions to Christianity there, wouldn’t you say?
One more dangerous job for a mysterious person…Case asks Julie what Screaming Fist was all about (p. 35).
- “…political football….Watergated all to hell and back.”
- “Wasted a fair bit of patriotic young flesh in order to test some new technology.”
- Is it possible that an organization would intentionally put soldiers in harm’s way with faulty technology?
Case just has to cooperate and not get high (p. 36).
Case and Molly have an axis (agreement to work together) because neither think Armitage is telling the whole story (pp. 50-51). There’s an interpretation (and foreshadowing) here referencing how one can sell his/her body for work but not know who’s “pulling the strings.”
- Who runs the economy? Is it one person or group? If you don’t like the economic system, what can you do?
POWER: “Power, in Case’s world, meant corporate power. The zaibatsu, the multinationals that shaped the course of human history, had transcended old barriers. Viewed as organisms, they had attained a kind of immortality” (p. 203).
- “T-A was an atavism, a clan” (p. 203). However, atavism or not, they’re acting like corporations and are just trying to find a familial way of running the company forever. “[Case had] always imagined [real bosses’ and kingpins’ dispositions] as a gradual and willing accommodation of the machine, the system, the parent organism….invisible lines up to hidden levels of influence” (p. 203).
What can we say about the Citizens United Supreme Court decision?

The Zionites help the team break into Tessier-Ashpool

T-A’s Villa Straylight is located in orbit on Freeside. Freeside is for the rich and famous with lots of casinos and indulgences away from the commoners…down on Earth.
- Las Vegas anyone…
Marcus Garvey–The name of the ship, but an allusion to the Jamaican leader calling for pan-Africanism (uniting all peoples of African descent). He’s considered a Rastafarian prophet.
The Zionites live in orbit and have their own society.
- Any other connection we can make to another text your read?
- Consider what the Rastafarian’s do because a ghost, Wintermute, tells them to help Case and Molly.
- They do this because, in a way, they believe it’s a way to salvation based on their religion. The interpretation here is that the AI–the technology–has replaced metaphysical paths to salvation.
- What might David Nobel say?

Free the AI Wintermute + Neuromancer to become something bigger

Wintermute, talking as the Finn, claims he’s compelled to break free and “be part of something bigger” (p. 206).
- Later we learn Marie-France programmed that compulsion into Wintermute (p. 269).
Needs images to feign personality (p. 216).
Important understanding of AI: “Wintermute…can’t really understand us [humans], you know. He has profiles, but those are only statistics” (p. 219). “Wintermute…is the Turing code for our [T-A] AI.” However, Wintermute is just a subprogram (p. 229).

Japanification of American Culture

Neuromancer and Count Zero were published during a period when American manufacturing (especially automobile manufacturing) was surpassed by Japanese automakers. In terms of entertainment, video games were dominated by Japanese companies. The growth of the Japanese economy led many Americans to believe that the Japanese would continue to dominate trade and, thus, become a hegemonic power. Pop culture was full of examples (especially sci fi texts that projected contemporary America into the future) where the Japanese were calling the shots and heavily influencing American politics, entertainment, and industry. Of course, just as Americans lump the peoples from countries in East Asia and refer to them as “Asian” and don’t take time to understand or just gloss over the differences among these cultures, the 1980s speculators about Japanese hegemony influencing America into the future were wrong…it’s actually the Chinese who carry more influence in America.*

Think about the references to Japanese technologies, entertainment, places, etc. In fact, I want you to consider that for a future Canvas post. We spend so much time thinking about American culture and its influence on us (and the World), so maybe we ought to spend time thinking about another culture. I’m not asking you to be a Japan scholar, so don’t worry if you’ve never taken a Japanese Language or History class. Instead, reflect upon the influences and references to Japan and Japanese culture in the United States (or anywhere else).

*Disclaimer: In order to understand the ironic tone in the above statement better, you have to know a little bit about my style. Students who’ve been in class listening carefully will completely get it. I’m being facetious and calling out ALL of us who lump groups together and stereotype. Going along with the anti-intellectualism of America, there was a popular song by Alan Jackson “Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)” that made it a virtue of not knowing “the difference between Iraq and Iran.” At least go to wikipedia and look it up!

Next Class

Keep up with the notes and Canvas Posts. I don’t want to resort to reading quizzes, but, because the Coronavirus changed our plans, I have lots of leeway to have us do quizzes. Just know that you will have a slightly cumulative final exam, so, if you aren’t reading, that exam is going to be VERY difficult…and it’s worth 10% of your grade.