What are the main arguments in the two readings for this week? What version of historical change do you believe in and why?

In Fraiberg’s article, several postmodern cultural theories which related to AIDS are discussed. Baudrillard argued the era of networks abolished the boundary between the private sector and the public. The Communication, in Baudrillard’s mind, eliminated the private secrets, spaces and scenes. By integrated with the network, the body will be influenced and lose its self-control status. Jameson’s implication on postmodern culture is theory of hyperspace which constructed a global networking based on multinational capital. To extend his theory into AIDS, the “general public can contract HIV as well.”(Fraiberg, Of Aids.) Haraway viewed the cyborg as a “cybernetic organism” that an organism combined both natural and artificial system. Based on her opinion, there is a balancing of cyborg between the hazard and “potent fusions”. Then, there are some AIDS criticism has been discussed in the article such as AIDS representation’s biological and historical context, and the conditioning of the disease’s contagion, quarantine, and contamination. In the end, Fraiberg argues the it is the cyborg integration is denied in the traditional realm of authority. However, the interconnectedness and the body resurfacing may shift the authorized sites to larger scale of recognition.

In Castells’s article, the main argument is to encourage sociology to root in scientific endeavor since people are losing their understanding about the development of society. The author firstly carried out four dimensions about social change, new technological such as genetic engineering, globalization issue such as institutional capacity, dominant cultural interaction such as multimedia hypertext, and the global economic issue between sovereign states. Then, the internet is set as a main component of new society; for example, the global financial markets are connected by the internet. The emerging of new society is considered as a new perspective, so it needs a new methodology to study it. Therefore, the study of sociology needs to be developed in order to answer the theoretical questions about network society in the future.

From late 20th century to the present, the entire world is moving towards globalization. The internet actually connected people more closely. However, people are losing their understanding about recent development and progress in society. Some people just adopted the new technologies such as internet, and digital devices; but they did not learn the meaning behind it. Thus, the study of the current social development is necessary.

Source：
Castells, M. (2000). Toward a Sociology of the Network Society. Contemporary Sociology. 29(5): 693-699.
Allison Fraiberg, "Of Aids, Cyborgs, and Other Indiscretions: Resurfacing the Body in the Postmodern." Postmodern Culture 1.3 (1991)