Medical Gothic: organ harvesting and medicalised abjection in Kazuo Ishiguro and Neal Shusterman.

Wasson, Sara-Patricia

Abstract

The International Gothic Association facilitates dissemination of research in Gothic and horror from the eighteenth century to the present, and the Conference is held once every two years. This year, the conference is entitled ‘Gothic Limits’ and contributors are asked to engage with the limits of the Gothic as a category. This paper examined potential intersections between Gothic literary study and medical humanities. Medical humanities can be defined as bringing the techniques of humanities scholarship (for example, textual analysis and considerations of narrative form) to bear on medical discourse and processes. Specifically, I examine disturbing contemporary fiction that engages with global organ harvesting and tissue mobilities. I suggest that Gothic studies can be valuable for analysing what I call ‘medicalised abjection’, i.e. moments where biotechnological medical networks operate to mark off certain people as not fully human.

Citation

Wasson, S. (2011, August). Medical Gothic: organ harvesting and medicalised abjection in Kazuo Ishiguro and Neal Shusterman. Paper presented at Gothic limits / Gothic Ltd.’: 10th Biennial Conference of the International Gothic Association. 2-5 August 2011

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (unpublished)
• Conference Name: Gothic limits / Gothic Ltd.’: 10th Biennial Conference of the International Gothic Association. 2-5 August 2011.
• Start Date: Aug 2, 2011
• End Date: Aug 5, 2011
• Deposit Date: Oct 10, 2011
• Peer Reviewed: Not Peer Reviewed
• Keywords: Gothic studies; medical humanities; abjection; Kazuo Ishiguro; Neal Shusterman
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/id/eprint/4647