The drone is an object of contradiction: at once a weapon of war and a medium of wonder. Often linked to destruction and death, the drone also sparks creativity and enhances education.
Encouraging us to think critically about the drone, the book traces its emergence in twenty-first-century warfare and examines its entanglement with surveillance culture, biopolitics, and artificial intelligence, as well as its representations in literature and the arts. Drones are instruments of power and tools of possibility—the book challenges us to see them as both.
Drones are reshaping how we understand war and peace, distance and time, privacy and surveillance, power and accountability, democracy and governance. This book invites readers to use the drone as a lens on our evolving human condition.
Preface: It’s quite beautiful Chapter 1: Rise of the Drone: Mobile Eye of Power Chapter 2: Drones, Digital Humanities, and the New Aesthetic Chapter 3: The Global Anarchy of the Surveillant Assemblage Chapter 4: Drone, Baby, Drone: Techno-neocolonialism and Postcolonial Mediations Chapter 5: Drone Cultures: Post-Digitality, Eversion, and the New Aesthetic Coda: Tragedy of the Commons: Democracy and the Practice of Freedom Bibliography
John Muthyala is a Professor in the Department of English at the University of Southern Maine, USA
Reviews for Drone Cultures: From Surveillance and Warfare to Literature and Art
Drones are everywhere in contemporary life and with these new perspectives there has been a dramatic change in visual culture from warfare to entertainment. Drone Cultures analyzes this fast-moving phenomenon from every conceivable angle. Muthyala’s timely critique examines these devices, their myriad uses, and their cultural imaginaries while cracking wide open the aporia between the drone’s entanglement with ‘dominance, destruction, and death’ and ‘creativity, research, and education.’ -- James E. Dobson, Associate Professor of English and Creative Writing, Dartmouth College, USA. Author of 'The Birth of Computer Vision'
