This short talk considers the human-robot boundary, outlining the early 20th century historical context for influential science fictions such as H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds (1898), Karel Čapek's play Rossum's Universal Robots (1921) and Fritz Lang's Expressionist film Metropolis (1927). It then considers more contemporary cyborgs including recent films and TV shows such as Limitless, Her, Lucy, Fringe, and Continuum.

1. Historicising the
Human-Robot Boundary
Lecturer in Modern & Contemporary
Literature
Birkbeck, University of London
Dr Caroline Edwards

2. Technological Anxieties:
The Cybernetic Imagination
E. M. Foster, “The Machine Stops” (1909)

3. The Natural/Machinic
Boundary: Edwardian
Alien Invasions
H. G. Wells, The War of
the Worlds (1898)

4. Liberal versus
Mechanical Culture

5. Technological
Anxieties:
Robot Rebellions
Karel Čapek,
R.U.R. (1920)

6. Early SF Drama

7. Metropolis (Dir. Fritz
Lang, 1927)
Gendered Robots:
Demonic Technology &
Female Sexuality

8. Computerized
Consciousness:
Androids & Other
Sentient Machines

9. Cyborgs: The
Meeting of Human
& Machine

10. Lucy (Dir. Luc
Besson, 2014)
Continuum
(Simon
Barry, 2012-)
Limitless (Dir. Neil
Burger, 2011)
Biotechnology:
Enhanced Humans
Fringe (J. J. Abrams,
2008-2013)