Customer Reviews

What it Means to be Human: Reflections from 1791 to the Present

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This is an ambitious work by a cultural historian in the "Foucauldian/Derridian" mould who aims at delving into our cultural attitudes and beliefs in order to debunk our moral categories and anthropological hierarchies.She is unfortunately overreaching herself in this work as she admits readily that the implications of any investigation into what it means to be human are potentially immense.In fact one wonders at the end of the book if it is a realistic or a fruitful task at all to pursue as she asserts her support for "a negative ontology ".She coins an equivocal term ,"negative zoelogy" to describe her approach which she hopes will inject instability and indeterminacy into our cognitive categories and subvert attempts at defining identities.

Although the themes she attempts to tackle may be thought provoking, I found her approach unstructured,lacking philosophical coherence and her rambling opinions on disparate topics quite tiresome as the text sprawls into too many directions and succumbs to irrationality as a result of an unwavering will to subvert and denounce.
To my mind the thrust of the book fails as it falls between different aims.It is in part a historical enquiry into certain western moral attitudes towards women and animals combined with an essay on human and animal rights which digress into more controversial topics like stem cell research, transplantation of animal tissues and cannibalism as well as a host of contemporary ambivalent bioethical issues e.g. vegetarianism, cosmetic surgery and so forth.We get a real mishmash of cultural history, social/ cultural criticism and high brow moralising.

If you like your history/anthropology books laced with large helpings of " Deconstructionist "French theory and pretentious bioethical discourse thrown in ,with a topping of unusual literary examples then you will enjoy this one!For me it was mostly a tedious read occasionally lightened by the odd interesting reflection , but may be I have unimaginative pedestrian tastes.

Inspired by a pseudonymously written letter asking, "Are women animals?" Bourke, in this is a long, scholarly book proceeded to examine what it means to be a human. The exercise was conducted from various angles and diverse perspectives. It is a rich source of literary examples, starting with Franz Kafka's talking ape "Red Peter" to Derrida's cat that defies categorisation by simply existing, and, Levina's dog, "Bobby" that patently does not distinguish humans into the categories that the Nazis had.

The book, however, rambled along interspersing Human Rights, Darwinian revolution, animal rights, vegetarianism, cannibalism, and various other interesting aspects that distinguish animals from humans and those that make no distinction. The ultimate point being that in spite of clear and ostensible differences, it would be morally wrong to think that we can justifiably treat our fellow men, women, and non-human animals in any way that we would not treat ourselves. In the course of which serious questions are raised, for example, "Do animals have rights?" Questions were also raised about bioethical matters such as whether it is right to have cosmetic surgery, using animal parts for transplantation into humans, using drugs to counter the aging process. The questions cannot be answered fully in most specialist books, so they tended to fall a little flat because Bourke had attempted to do too much with the book.

If the reader is patient he may wish to add another star or two. If he is not, he might subtract one or two stars. This is indeed a fascinating, thought-provoking book that requires determination for one to come to grips with it; and more importantly, to pursue the answers to many of the questions Bourke raised. It has many useful materials but lacks a coherent structure to put them all together. I gave it three stars because I (subjectively) am not fond of the sprawling nature of the discussions, and further, I would reserve judgment on some of the matters that Bourke passed judgment on. For example, "Men and women who undertook rejuvenation treatments are, literally, selling their souls and debasing their bodies in exchange for eternal - or at least extended - life." p. 349.