Masters Thesis

Human (Re)Defined: The Problematic (Dis)Connection between Bodily Representations and Consciousness. A Personal Narrative of Literary Theories and Texts

The thesis contests that the physical body is insignificant and temporary: whereas consciousness is invaluable and boundless. All forms of consciousnesses, human or not, are valid regardless of the physical form. However, human society has consistently used physical bodies to determine the validity of a being’s consciousness. The presence of a physical body is not enough to identify a human experience and cannot be the sole factor determining one’s humanity. The recognition and acceptance of one’s humanity is vital for the success and happiness of a person. Without which, the person is unable to establish its own agency. The solution to such a dissociation is to recognize and incorporate the experiences of textual representations into one's own. Textual representations allow for the ultimate freedom by giving a person the ability to explore all embodied human experiences regardless of their physical representation. The permeability of human experiences through textual representations makes the physical body irrelevant when determining one's humanity. Through personal narrative and theoretical analysis, this thesis redefines “human” beyond the obsolete paradigm of gendered humanity to include all consciousness without conformity to bodily representations.

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