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Jonathan Goldberg "Recalling Totalities" In The Cyborg Handbook; edited by Chris Hables Gray, Heidi Figueroa-Sarriera, and Steven Mentor; New York: Routledge, 1995 (pp. 233-254) In this essay, Jonathan Goldberg offers a psychoanalytic and semiotic reading of cyborgs as they have been represented in cinema. More specifically, Goldberg focuses his attention on the various roles Arnold Schwarzenegger has played from Pumping Iron and Twins through Terminator and Total Recall. He explores the role of the paternal, the maternal, sexual desire, and identification, as well as the narcissistic ideals of the ageless, timeless body. While suggesting that the desire for cyborgian reproduction represents a "repudiation of biological production,” Goldberg describes how 'Arnold films' also reinscribe hero myths, 'savior' tropes, and traditional archetypes of the nuclear family. Ultimately, Goldberg argues that reversals, rereadings, and slippage in these cyborgian narratives always remain open for future political possibilities: 'the image is not set.' L.E. Fazen |