Cyborg myths, masculine myths: Representations of masculine control and the female cyborg in Alex Garland’s EX MACHINA.

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of masculine control on representations of the female body in Alex Garland's Ex Machina. It has two major purposes: (1) to investigate power in terms of control with the use of feminist poststructuralist discourse analysis (2) to demonstrate what influence power has on the representation of the female body. My aim is to show how what feminists have called the “masculine myth” might still have effect in the representations of female bodies — in this case the female cyborg body — and to consider the potential for this figure to operate as a site of change. It is an attempt to create awareness and look critically at images through which we create meaning about femininity and the representation of female bodies. The background will highlight the terms 'masculine myth', 'dichotomies' and 'cyborg politics' to create a firm base for understanding the theory. The theory is based on works of Shohini Chaudhuri, Barbara Creed, Teun van Dijk, Donna Haraway, Andreas Huyssen and Sadie Plant and, to a lesser extent, Anne Balsamo and Michel Foucault. In the analysis the focus lies on scenes where we can see the relation between the characters Nathan (Oscar Isaac) and Ava (Alicia Vikander), as well as Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) and Ava. In these scenes I will be looking for particular myths and power structures at work that position the characters and events in terms of dichotomies such as mind/body, woman/man. The analysis will mainly focus on the double fear of technology and woman. The results show that in Garland’s EX MACHINA we can clearly see the role of masculine control in constructing the female body. There are two types of fear we see, fear of technology and fear of woman. Both carry an Otherness within them that makes them both a threat to masculine identity and control. When used as a myth, Ava and Kyoko are the boundary dwelling figure Donna Haraway talks about in her Cyborg Manifesto. Ava is a lens which brings masculine control to light and shows how woman is still connected to fear and threat. It was concluded that when we look at Ava as a real feminine body, instead of a myth, we see that even the cyborg is defined within patriarchal society, giving here the same position as women in society. She is constantly controlled and defined by male characters given ‘typical’ female traits that go with her female shaped cyborg body. Dichotomous thinking is highlighted as we have seen that body/mind is one of the dichotomies repeatedly returning.