Neither Cyborg Nor Goddess: The (Im)Possibilities of Cyberfeminism

Abstract

This chapter traces the discursive strands located within the (often) mono-lithically defined cyberfeminism. As cyberfeminism is often identified as a compelling component of third wave feminism — owing to the metonymic slip of both cyberfeminism and third wave feminism with ‘the popular’ — the conservative ramifications of cyberfeminism have implications for those activities and theories grouped under the label of the third wave. The communication technologies of cyberspace are regarded as the opportunity needed to bring about the global feminist movements of the new millennium, the ‘third wave’ of feminism. The Internet is thus vaunted as the global consciousness-raising tool which the first and second waves lacked. What could it mean to claim that ‘[o]n the edge of the millennium, feminists are paying closer attention to the Internet — as a powerful cultural space and an important political tool’ and to ask ‘what role will the Internet play in the “global women’s movement” and how are feminists on-line shaping and re-shaping what the “global women’s movement” is imagined to be?’ (Hunt 147) Yet the myth of cyberfeminism — that women are using cyberspace in powerful and transgressive ways — far exceeds what is actually taking place online.