Introduction

Svitlana Matviyenko

Judith Roof

pp. 1-13

in: Svitlana Matviyenko, Judith Roof (eds), Lacan and the posthuman, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018

Abstract

When Ihab Hassan introduced the term "posthumanism" in 1977, it marked a state of powerlessness and disorientation in face of rapidly changing humanities. "We need first to understand that the human form—including human desire and all its external representations—may be changing radically, and thus must be re-visioned", he urged. "We need to understand that five hundred years of humanism may be coming to an end, as humanism transforms itself into something that we must helplessly call posthumanism".