The Haraway Reader

by Donna J. Haraway

The Haraway Reader brings together a generous selection of Donna Haraway's work, she is one of our keenest observers of nature, science, and the social world and this volume is ideal introduction to her thought.

Genres: Feminism, Philosophy, Nonfiction, Theory, Essays, Gender Studies, Science

352 pages, Paperback

First published October 15, 2003

About the author

Donna J. Haraway is an American Professor Emerita in the History of Consciousness Department and Feminist Studies Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz, United States. She is a prominent scholar in the field of science and technology studies, described in the early 1990s as a "feminist, rather loosely a postmodernist". Haraway is the author of numerous foundational books and essays that bring together questions of science and feminism, such as "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century" (1985) and "Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective". Additionally, for her contributions to the intersection of information technology and feminist theory, Haraway is widely cited in works related to Human Computer Interaction (HCI). Her Situated Knowledges and Cyborg Manifesto publications in particular, have sparked discussion within the HCI community regarding framing the positionality from which research and systems are designed. She is also a leading scholar in contemporary ecofeminism, associated with post-humanism and new materialism movements. Her work criticizes anthropocentrism, emphasizes the self-organizing powers of nonhuman processes, and explores dissonant relations between those processes and cultural practices, rethinking sources of ethics.

Haraway has taught Women's Studies and the History of Science at the University of Hawaii and Johns Hopkins University. Haraway's works have contributed to the study of both human-machine and human-animal relations. Her works have sparked debate in primatology, philosophy, and developmental biology. Haraway participated in a collaborative exchange with the feminist theorist Lynn Randolph from 1990 to 1996. Their engagement with specific ideas relating to feminism, technoscience, political consciousness, and other social issues, formed the images and narrative of Haraway's book Modest_Witness for which she received the Society for Social Studies of Science's (4S) Ludwik Fleck Prize in 1999. In 2000, Haraway was awarded the Society for Social Studies of Science's John Desmond Bernal Prize for her distinguished contributions to the field of science and technology studies. Haraway serves on the advisory board for numerous academic journals, including differences, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, Contemporary Women's Writing, and Environmental Humanities.

Reviews

[missy jean · Rating 5 out of 5]

I might as well just go ahead and rate it, even though I think I will have to read it three times through before I understand it well enough to give you a synopsis :) Dense as dense, but so, so brilliant.

[Jessica Zu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Donna Haraway is said to be one of the hardes to read. I don't agree. She is not easy to read, but her writing is so full of wit, info and wisdom :) I totally love the way she play with words in serious writings. Life is too short to NOT full around :) I love her writing style, the way she takes up issues in moder biology and biotech, the angles and positions she stands and the unique perspectives she illuminate from her point of view. I know she is hard to imitate. Nonetheless, I"d love to be an independent thinker just like her. Actually, I wanna be better:) We'll see how far I can go from her.

[Laurel Perez · Rating 4 out of 5]

These seminal essays by Donna Haraway are the "easiest" to understand (though Haraway is never really precise) as she mentions in the book. These thought provoking and informative essays explore feminist techno-science studies that bring up questions we have not yet answered. I'm still thinking these over, and I know I will have to revisit this book again for meaning, and depth.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

donna haraway is a genius. favorites: cyborg manifesto obviously and teddy bear patriarchy.

"To write theory; ie, to produce a patterned vision of how to move and what to fear in the topography of an impossible but all-too-real present, in order to find an absent, but perhaps possible, other present....Theory is bodily and theory is literal. Theory is not about matters distant from the lived body; quite the opposite."