The Concept of Political Myth in Philosophy of Donna Haraway

UDC 14

https://doi.org/10.20339/AM.10-22.044

Dmitry. A. Yumartov, PhD Student at Philosophy Faculty of Lomonosov Moscow State University,

e-mail: frederickfithroy@mail.ru

The article examines the concept of “political myth” in Donna Haraway’s essay “A Cyborg Manifesto”. Based on Haraway’s ontology on the material-semiotic unity and interconnection, it’s argued that she understands the political myth as a semantic interpretation of material and social reality, which later becomes a collective consciousness and transforms (customizes) reality for itself. Two types of political myths are distinguished in Haraway’s philosophy. Firstly, these are the myths of the past, hidden and unconscious identities (concept of man, woman, nature, culture, objectivity), where subjects with mythical mind do not reflect myth authenticity. Secondly, the new myth about a cyborg as a creature with no boundaries of human, animal and machine, with blurred lines of gender, racial and other relevancy. A cyborg is understood as, on the one hand, figure that arises and does not exist in reality, on the other hand, as figure that needs to be handled as a reality now for the actual (material) implementation of cyborgization in the future. If Haraway’s views on the “myths of the past” are fully consistent with the concept of political myth in R. Bart, E. Cassirer or C. Flood as an irrational collective image that hides its elusive elements, but the myth of cyborgs is consciously and openly staged by its own heroes, who solidarize with each other with the idea of opposing every forms of rooting and manipulative totalization, who understand their being inside the myth and work together to make it a reality, which brings Haraway’s concept closer to Georges Sorel’s concept of a political myth.

Key words: Haraway, cyborg, flat ontologies, posthumanism, political myth, comparative analysis, concept reconstruction.

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