@mastersthesis {69,
	title = {Technology, ecology and spirituality: neopaganism and hybrid ontologies in technoculture},
	year = {2008},
	month = {2008},
	school = {Murdoch University},
	abstract = {This thesis considers three convergent issues pertinent to investigations of identity and agency in contemporary society: the proliferation of digital, network technologies, the rise of interest in secular {\textemdash} {\textquoteleft}new edge{\textquoteright} {\textemdash} spiritualities, and our growing awareness of impending ecological crises. I argue that these three issues necessitate a critical reconsideration of human agency, one that embodies a more sustainable and responsible {\textquoteleft}being-in-the-world{\textquoteright}. With this goal in mind, I apply the insights of ecofeminism, feminist approaches to technology and science, and the philosophy of technology, to provide a critical analysis of the human-technology relation in the broader contexts of gender, ecology and spirituality. In particular, I highlight the strengths of ecofeminism, and then employ several alternative theories in order to attend to limitations I identify within ecofeminism; in particular, its uncompromising stance towards modern technology as wholly patriarchal and damaging to both nature and women. Against this position, I argue that technology is fully embedded in and central to our being-in-the-world, and thus must be accounted for in any consideration of contemporary agency. I then attend to both technophobic and technophilic approaches to technology and technoscience in feminism more generally, suggesting how these oppositional tensions are embodied in the figures of the {\textquoteleft}cyborg{\textquoteright} and the {\textquoteleft}goddess{\textquoteright}. In search of more complex, hybridised ways to understand the human-technology relation, I then turn to three key theorists {\textendash} Don Ihde, Donna Haraway and Bruno Latour. Synergising their approaches with the neopagan worldview, I propose a metaphorical and material identity which properly attends to and incorporates the treble issues of ecology, technology and spirituality into its worldview: the technopagan. At once nature-worshipper and digital dweller, the technopagan is a dynamic, multi-faceted and adaptable agent that can effectively challenge traditional humanist binaries between nature and technology, science and religion, and human and nonhuman.},
	keywords = {ecology, neopaganism, Spirituality, technology},
	url = {http://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/706/},
	author = {Susan Gallacher}
}
