Rebecca M. Rosen// What are the requirements for biological personhood? Are biological gestation or unaided longevity necessary preconditions, or optional? Foundation, the Apple TV+ series whose first season aired in the fall of 2021, is one of many recent scripted dramas to explore these question of personhood from the perspective of synthetic and biological beings,…
Author: Rebecca M. Rosen
Rebecca M. Rosen (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of English at Murray State University. Her book project, Postmortem Life: Anatomy, Autopsy and Testimony in Early America, considers how the voices of deceased people were extracted, interpreted, or stifled through forensic means, and how such practices formed the basis of an autoptic culture of testimonial retrieval in early America and the larger Atlantic world. This study demonstrates how postmortem practices illuminate conceptions of the deceased body as subject, object, and witness, and how such formulations contributed to the development of life writing.
Synthetic Life: Anatomy, Paternity, and Personhood in Star Trek: Picard
Rebecca M. Rosen // What truly constitutes a person—their consciousness or their anatomy? Who determines “real” personhood, and how much does biological human(oid) anatomy have to do with that? Which is all to say, what is a person, and who can call themselves “real”? These are the questions viewers are prompted to address in Star…