"Cognitive Science, Deconstruction, and the (Non) Speaking (Non) Human Being"

Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2006 @ 7:30 p.m.
Gallery Theater

Cary Wolfe
Rice University

Cary Wolfe’s work examines, in the context of postmodern philosophical approaches and science, the categories of animal and human, raising the question of whether non-humans are subjects. Wolfe’s adaptation of deconstructive and other theoretical approaches, developed originally from the study of literature and language, in an effort to fashion posthumanist theories of nature, shows the heightened relevance (in new forms) of thinking about the humanities to the non-human and even to the human as non-human. His writings have been hailed by cyborg-theorist Donna Haraway and others for raising questions that help to redefine constructively the debate over nature in Western culture. He is the Bruce and Elizabeth Dunlevie Professor of English at Rice University.