Although Haraway intended her concept of the cyborg to be a feminist critique, she acknowledges that other scholars and popular media have taken her concept and applied it to different contexts. Haraway is aware and receptive of the different uses of her concept of the cyborg, but admits "very few people are taking what I consider all of its parts".[3] Wired Magazine overlooked the feminist theory of the cyborg and instead used it to make a more literal commentary about the enmeshment of humans and technology.[4] Despite this, Haraway also recognizes that new feminist scholars "embrace and use the cyborg of the manifesto to do what they want for their own purposes".[3]
Patchwork Girl
Shelley Jackson, author of Patchwork Girl.Patchwork Girl, a hypertext work, makes use of elements from "A Cyborg Manifesto". Patchwork Girl's "thematic focus on the connections between monstrosity, subjectivity, and new reproductive technologies is apparent from its very first page, when readers, or users, open the hypertext to find a picture of a scarred and naked female body sewn together with a single dotted line...Readers enter the text by clicking on this body and following its 'limbs' or links to different sections of the text."[5] In Jackson's narrative, the Patchwork Girl is an aborted female monster created by Victor Frankenstein of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus, an abhorrent and monstrous creature that is "part male, part female, part animal, 175 years old, and 'razed' up through hypertext technology."[5] The monster, following her destruction by Victor, is sewn back together by Mary Shelley herself, while simultaneously becoming Mary's lover; she is thus, "a cyborg who is queer, dis-proportioned, and visibly scarred. She both facilitates and undermines preoccupations with the benefits and dangers of reproductive technologies by embracing all of the monstrosities that reproductive/fetal screenings are imagined to 'catch' and one day prevent."[5] The Patchwork Girl embraces Haraway's conception of a cybernetic posthuman being in both her physical multiplicity and her challenge towards "the images and fantasies sustaining reproductive politics."[5]
"Cyborg Goddesses"
Turkish critical scholar Leman Giresunlu uses Haraway's cyborg as framework to examine current science fiction movies such as Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Resident Evil in her essay "Cyborg Goddesses: The Mainframe Revisited".[6] In this essay, she explores how her new concept of the cyborg goddess, a female figure "capable of inflicting pain and pleasure simultaneously", can be used to make sense of how female representation is shifting towards a more multidimensional stance. Giresunlu builds from Haraway's cyborg because the cyborg goddess goes beyond "offering a way out from [the] duality" and instead provides how spirituality and technology work together to form a complex and more accurate representation of women.[6]
"Mind Over Matter"
In her essay "Mind Over Matter: Mental Evolution and Physical Devolution in The Incredible Shrinking Man", American critical scholar Ruthellen Cunnally uses Haraway's cyborg to help make sense of how Robert Scott Carey, the protagonist of The Incredible Shrinking Man, transforms into a cyborg in the midst of a metaphor of cold war politics in his home. As Robert continues to shrink, the gendered power dynamic between him and his wife Louise shifts from "the realm of husband/wife into the mode of mother/son".[7] When Robert finds himself lost in the feminine space of the basement, an area of the house that was reserved for Louise's domestic duties of sewing and washing, he is forced to fight for his life and reclaim his masculinity. Although he is able to conquer some of his foes and regain his "manhood", the gender lines do not become established again because there is no one to share and implement the gendered power structure with. Robert's transformation presents "an existence in which acceptance and meaning are released from the limitations of patriarchal dualisms", which aligns with Haraway's cyborg.[7]
