The Animated Object: Fearing Technology

In his article entitled The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology, Alfred Gell discusses the dazzling effects of objects as resulting from the display of artistry inherent in the making of the object. The viewer is enchanted with the “power” and “magic” of the artisan who crafted something inexplicably superb, rather than with the tangible object itself. While this discourse obviously has merit, it ignores at least one aspect of objects that has compelled people across time and space: the performative aspects of the object. How an object performs has major implications for how that object has agency; for example, the performance of a computer directly affects and influences the person using the machine. In fact, the breakdown of a computer can often lead to intense emotional responses, as though the machine had personally offended the user. This example illustrates how objects may sometimes seem to have minds or agendas of their own, as well as agency. These cases speak to not only an enchantment of technology, but also the fear of it.

Although the fear of technology has perhaps always been at least a subconscious notion, it has come to the forefront with the innovations of the 20th and 21st centuries. As technologies such as cars and computers have become increasingly self-maintaining and automatic, the fear of them becoming completely autonomous has been played out in many science fiction horror stories, such as in Philip K. Dick novels, or in movies like the Terminator trilogy. The most classic story of a creation becoming dangerously autonomous is of course Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, which is probably the ultimate example of enchantment with technology as well as the blurring of the delineation between subject and object.

Although these stories are unhesitatingly categorized as fiction, the collective human fear that they portray is, and has been, a very real specter for centuries. By extending the discourse of object-subject blurring, as well as the perceived potential danger of objects having human qualities, the compelling nature of figurines and idols can be explored. Arguably, modern perceptions of these anthropomorphic figures from the past understand them to be the material ancestors of cars, computers, or Frankenstein’s monster, since, as representations of humans, figurines can be understood as having an inherent potential for agency, or even life. The more human-like figurines are, the greater this potential becomes. Gell offers a telling example of this understanding in his discourse on “witnessing as agency,” in which he analyzes the animism and agency that is enacted in idols when they are depicted with eyes: “…the key to the process of animation seems, initially at least, to depend on the logic of looking and being seen” (118). Gell points out that the idol’s gaze makes actions verbs, such as “look,” applicable to the object (118). By actively “gazing,” the idol mirrors the gaze of the worshipper, creating a bridge and likeness between the human and the object. By endowing an object with human qualities, the boundaries between subject and object are blurred, and the agentic object garners the potential of having a life of its own.

The fear of technology is founded on the notion of “dead” objects somehow coming to life—a subversion of the “natural” order. While the notion is frightening from the standpoint that a thing should not have agency or life, it also implies that humans, who are supposed to have agency, may lose control and power. When objects have influence over us, the usual subject-object relationship is inverted: people become objectified as controllable and influenced objects.

Bibliography

Gell, Alfred; 1992. "The technology of enchantment and the enchantment of technology," in Anthropology, art and aesthetics. Jeremy Coote and Anthony Shelton (eds.). Oxford: Clarendon Press, 40-63.

Gell, Alfred; 1998. Art and agency: an anthropological theory. Oxford and New York: Clarendon Press.