TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures: An Intersectional Case.

The cyborgization of brainbodies with computer hardware and software today ranges in scope from the realization of Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) to visions of mind upload to silicon, the latter being targeted toward a transhuman future. Refining posthumanist concepts to formulate a posthumanities perspective, and contrasting those approaches with transhumanist trajectories, I explore the intersectional dimension of realizations and visions of neuro-technological developments, which I name TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures. In an intersectional analysis, I investigate the embedding and legitimation of transhumanist visions brought about by neuroscientific research and neuro-technological development based on a concept of modern neurobiological determinism. The conjoined trajectories of BCI research and development and transhumanist visions perpetuate the inscription of intersectional norms, with the concomitant danger of producing discriminatory effects. This culminates in normative capacity being seen as a conflation of the abled, successful, white masculinized techno-brain with competition. My deeper analysis, however, also enables displacements within recent BCI research and development to be characterized: from ''thought-translation" to affective conditioning and from controllability to obstinacy within the BCI, going so far as to open the closed loop. These realizations challenge notions about the BCI's actor status and agency and foster questions about shifts in the corresponding subject-object relations. Based on these analyses, I look at the effects of neuro-technological and transhumanist governmentality on the question of whose lives are to be improved and whose lives should be excluded from these developments. Within the framework of political feminist materialisms, I combine the concept of posthumanities with my concept of TechnoBrainBodies-in-Cultures to envision and discuss a material-discursive strategy, encompassing dimensions of affect, sociality, resistance, compassion, cultural diversity, ethnic diversity, multiple sexes/sexualities, aging, dis/abilities-in short, all of this "intersectional stuff"-as well as obstinate techno-brain agencies and contumacies foreseen in these cyborgian futures.

Neurofeminism and feminist neurosciences: a critical review of contemporary brain research.

To date, feminist approaches to neurosciences have evaluated the debates surrounding practices of knowledge production within and research results of contemporary brain research. Consequently, neurofeminist scholars have critically examined gendered impacts of neuroscientific research. Feminist neuroscientists also develop research approaches for a more gender-appropriate neuroscientific research on several levels. Based on neurofeminist critique feminist neuroscientists aim to enrich neuroscientific work by offering methodological suggestions for a more differentiated setup of categories and experimental designs, for reflective result presentations and interpretations as well as for the analysis of result validity. Reframing neuro-epistemologies by including plasticity concepts works to uncover social influences on the gendered development of the brain and of behavior. More recently, critical work on contemporary neurocultures has highlighted the entanglements of neuroscientific research within society and the implications of 'neurofacts' for gendered cultural symbolisms, social practices, and power relations. Not least, neurofeminism critically analyses the portrayal of neuro-knowledge in popular media. This article presents on overview on neurofeminist debates and on current approaches of feminist neurosciences. The authors conclude their review by calling for a more gender-appropriate research approach that takes into account both its situatedness and reflections on the neuroscientific agenda, but also questions neurofeminist discourse in regards to uses and misuses of its concepts.

On sex/gender related similarities and differences in fMRI language research.

Again and again, attempts have been made to find correlates of sex/gender differences in the human brain. Despite the insistence with which differences have been stated, empirical results have not been unequivocal: evidence for and against the influence of sex in the makeup of men's and women's brains has been presented. This article focuses on the relevance of sex/gender related differences in fMRI research, especially with regard to language processing. By discussing some crucial criteria from fMRI examinations, we demonstrate the existence of paradigmatic, methodological and statistical defaults that interfere with assessing the presence or absence of sex/gender differences. These criteria are, among others, the use of contrast analyses, the function of the variable sex/gender as a co-item and the "publication bias". It is argued that dealing with the sex/gender variable will, at least to some degree, inevitably lead to the detection of differences rather than to the detection of similarities.

WITHDRAWN: On sex/gender related similarities and differences in fMRI language research.

This article has been withdrawn at the request of the author(s) and/or editor. The Publisher apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause. The full Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal can be found at http://www.elsevier.com/locate/withdrawalpolicy.