prostheses

ALL OBJECTS ARE PROSTHESES By Ruth Sumner

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A L L O B J E C T S A R E P R O S T H E S E S.

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Ruth Sumner

IDDN 371 Project four

Prostheses play a far deeper role in society than just false teeth, peg legs and glasses; Prostheses

are the creation of co-joined words in modern language, they are a fake nose on the protagonist

in a film, they are a physical memorial to absence, and they venerate the idealized utopia of

augmentation (The Six Million Dollar Man.1) Prostheses are the emotional crutch we lean on

when times are tough, they are the puzzle piece to fulfill a deficiency, and most importantly of all

Prostheses are defined as the consumptive objects we empty our pockets for and congest our

lives with.

All objects are prostheses, extensions of the body, the tools we use to discover the world.

The process of design is euphemistically defined as ‘changing existing situations into preferred ones’

(Simon 1962) where preference leans toward an evolution of ideologies. This objective towards an

idealised status of perfection is eloquently contextualised by Sylvia Plath in the following diary

excerpt: “minute by minute to fight upward. Out from under that black cloud which would annihilate my whole

being with its demand for perfection and measure, not of what I am, but of what I am not.” (Plath 2000)

There is an obsession and fascination for perfection in the design profession, where the vocation

is to create an altruistic idealised world; the invention of the perfect ‘utopia’ that is better than

what the present moment holds. Perfectionism is thus more about an idealisation of the future,

rather than an acceptance of the present state.

1 The television series ‘the six million dollar man’ is about a former astronaut with bionic implants, based on the novel: (Caidin 1972)


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“The ideal of a rational and predictable social order based on conformity to presumably universal norms.” (Woods

2010)

In the present, as viewed in reflection to the ‘preferred situation’, there lies the contrasting

condition to that of perfectionism. The relationship between body and external [object] produces

the misanthropic ‘Mr. Hyde2’ character, and is venerated through the curious voyeurism of the

abnormal, the flawed, the imperfect, the incomplete, all are labeled as a disability. The World

Health Organization (W.H.O) defines disabilities as ‘an interaction between features of a person’s body and

features of the society in which he or she lives.’ The construct of society is the manufacturer of the lofty-

ideals, creating disabled of the able-bodied. Generating a society that relies on external means for

survival, these externals are prostheses. “Many people remain excluded and disabled by design that does not

acknowledge their abilities.” (Pullin 2009)

In 1553, the Greek word ‘prosthesis’ was first used in the English language to define the addition

of a syllable to the beginning of a word. (Wills 1995) It wasn’t until 150 years later, that the

(medical) definition primarily used today was applied “The replacement of defective or absent parts of the

body by artificial substitutes.” (O.E.D) The prosthetic is seen (both literally and metaphorically) as a

‘crutch’, an artificial object to remedy a deficiency. A deficiency is when something is incomplete,

for example an unfinished novel; as the narrative develops and unfolds there is a subtle nagging

of the incomplete eating away at any sense of fulfilment.

A deficiency is also defined in the sense of the nutritional lack there-of, as they say ‘you are what

you eat.3’ Hence the same holds true for what is consumed in terms of objects as prostheses; if

one substitutes certain words in the following, there is a striking resemblance to the uptake of

objects within society. “Expensive multivitamin tablets protect the well-fed people who can afford them against

deficiency diseases they will never experience.” (Pyke 1968)

If indeed all objects are prosthetics, then there must reside a great fissure of deficiency in

societies well of being. However, the consumption of the artificial affects one on a deeper level.

When you wear clothes produced under slavery conditions, would one not take on a part of the

essence this garments short past embodies, as the object is a prosthetic to your self.

For example, the 1948 film The Red Shoes (directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger)

that is based on a Hans Christian Andersen story about a young Ballerina who falls in love with a

pair of possessed shoes. When she puts the shoes on the ballerina is forced to dance until she

2 Read: Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Stevenson 1886) 3 Abbreviated from the French "Dis-moi ce que tu manges, je te dirai ce que tu es." [Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are]. (Brillat-Savarin 1842)


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dies of fatigue. The Ballerina is a consumer unbeknownst to the object’s past narrative of which

is passed on to future wearers/users.

“Memory, the wheel, the pen, what you will -the human hand is superseded by the machine in the service of

truth.” (Wills 1995)

The prosthetic is an artificial derivation of the authentic. Therefore consumables have a deeper

impact on the self than just the function of enabling one to walk, to see, to write. There is also

the lure of an object and its effect on ones desired identity, “Ideals pose significant barriers to

authenticity.” (Van Pelt 2000) Authenticity is the truthful genuineness of something, the history, the

origin and the resultant narrative. The artificial nature that prosthetics are derived from and the

quality of ones experience with consumables, impacts the essence of being on a level much

deeper than the superficial as expressed above.

Take the personal music player for example, in the 1980’s this was personified as the boombox,

with their “wheel-sized speakers protected by silvery-black grilles; lots of chunky knobs and buttons.” (Sisario

2010) These monolithic ‘appendages’ seen particularly on the streets of New York, represented

something more than just a personal music player. In contrast a current audio prosthesis of the

private, almost internalised ‘i-pod’ player, the only physical sign of usage is the ubiquitous white

cords sprouting from the ears of passers-by. “Our technological creations are great extrapolations of the

bodies that our genes build. In this way, we can think of technology as our extended body.” (Kelly 2010)

The prioritising of the concealment of the prosthesis likens it more to a bodily-implant than an

appendage. For example, how the medical prosthetics’ traditional ‘pink flesh’ colouring acts as a

temporary camouflage to the observer.

The usage of contact lenses as a (medical) prosthetic to enable visual acuity, speaks also of the

concealment of prosthetics. Invented in 1827 by an English astronomer, contacts were described

as “small saucer-shaped lenses, filled with a transparent gelatinous substance.” (Kett 1946) However the initial

usage of “changing eyes prosthetically dates to 1934, when a makeup artist named Reuben

Greenspoon used contact lenses” (O.E.D) on a big screen actor. The link between the medical

term for prosthesis and a desired augmentation through consumables is clear.

To view the argument through the literal eyes of a prosthetic, is to see through a pair of glasses,

which not only enhance ones vision of the world, but also act on a much deeper level. Glasses

are not only ‘the frame’ to ones face, but they become a part of the person, the identity, being

described as “having a wearer not a user, setting up a different relationship.” (Pullin 2009) In fact,

the idiom user in relation to objects (prosthetics) is redundant “avoid the term user because it sounds too

functional, too focused on a task, whereas products affect us by being owned, carried, or worn.” (Ibid.)


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When glasses are broken, they are typically fixed with a bandaid, venerating the prosthesis as

something more than just an object; they are a part of your body. Much like a pair of false teeth,

a pen or a prosthetic arm all act in place of the authentic tool used for the task at hand.

“With every tool man is perfecting his own organs, whether motor or sensory, or is removing the limits to their

functioning.” (Freud 1961)

Whichever personification the object represents in and on the body, it continues to embody the

essence of prostheses. The prosthesis is a marker of an absence, a memorial site venerating the

lost. This empty artificial artefact acts in place of the original and is established to commemorate

the void. Objects act as a reminder, in much the same way as a statue of a dead hero implants

prosthetic memories unto the mind of the others’ experiences long forgotten. In the French film,

Un Long Dimanche de fiancielles, the character Manech suffers trauma (memory loss) due to the war,

thus ‘prosthetic memories’ are created to replace the authentic lost memories. For example,

Landsberg in ‘Prosthetic memory’, defines this self-defined term as “a new form of memory, […] at

the interface between a person and a historical narrative about the past, at an experiential site such as a movie

theatre or museum. In this moment of contact, an experience occurs through which the person sutures himself or

herself into a larger history.” (Landsberg 2004)

When an object (prosthetic) is inherited, it arrives pre-implanted with memories of its past life, so

what happens when a pair of glasses frames is inherited? Architect Lebbeus Woods fittingly

exclaims “knowledge cannot be passed on from one generation to the next, but only data, and therefore that

knowledge has to be continually re-invented, it seems we have to relive for ourselves all the tragedies and the

triumphs of being human, in order to learn their lessons.” (Woods 2010) Thus when objects are inherited, a

new narrative is formed through its modern experience, re-writing history, and furrowing a new

future. As the Replicant Roy states poignantly in Ridley Scott’s famous 1985 film, Blade Runner:

“If only you could see, what I have seen, with your eyes.” Perhaps as we become more cyborgian, with the

rapid uptake of technologies and prostheses into ones being, to see with another’s eyes would be

a logical thing to do. As design writer Per Mollerup said of glasses “what others see is more important

than what you see yourself.” (Mollerup 2001)

The idealised state endeavoured through prosthetics creates an augmentation of the ‘normal’, this

is termed as transhumanism, which is defined by World Transhumanist Association’s founder

Nick Bostrom as "the intellectual and cultural movement that affirms the possibility and desirability of

fundamentally improving the human condition through applied reason, especially by using technology to eliminate

aging and greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities” (Bostrom 2005) clearly

influenced by Nietzsche’s ambition for humanity dubbed the ‘Übermensch’ or ‘overhuman,

/superman’. (Nietzsche 1961). This purpose focused self is also sometimes called cyborgism; A

cyborg is described in Donna Haraways ‘Cyborg Manifesto’ as ‘a creature of social reality, a reflection of


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the other.’ (Haraway 1991) ‘The other’ being the ‘ego-ideal’ (Lacan 1977) termed by Jacques Lacan, to

which the self aspires and exploits as a comparison tool.

It is suggested in ‘what technology wants’ (Kelly 2010) that we have always been cyborgs, and are co-

evolving with our inventions. This evolution begins with the following example: In the 1968, epic

science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey, (Clarke 1968) the dawning of man is depicted on the

plains of the African Savannah, where the discovery of ‘object’ is portrayed. Just six minutes into

the film, a man-ape unearths the discarded bones of a tapir as a prosthetic; a tool to quicken

evolution. The bone (tool) transitions into a spaceship orbiting earth, resembling the evolved

state of prostheses, in parallel to human evolution.

“Objects are in some way, the thing we are all.” (Melville 2005)

All objects are mute to our language, “The tyranny of an object, he thought. It doesn’t know I exist. Like

the androids, it had no ability to appreciate the existence of another.” (Dick 1968) Whilst in defence they

make beeps, even sometimes speak, but their narrative is foreign, objects can be likened to

having Alzheimer's, where there is no recollection of the past. The muteness of objects can be of

great value though, enabling the user to create their own language and narrative about and with

their possessions. “People tend to imagine products as having personalities and that they tend to express a

preference for products that they perceive as reflecting their own personalities.” (Jordan 2000)

It’s about the co-existing relationship of bodies with objects, discovering the objects true

narrative unfolds simultaneously with you and creating a meaningful relationship together,

especially as objects enter deeper into our private worlds, they become charged with personal

meaning. This newly formed narrative allows a “continuity of consciousness organised on the

basis of a concrete-qualitative sense of time and its manifestations: experience, subjective

recollection and the individual. It thus crucially informs the development of distinctively modern

understandings of personal and moral qualities such as self-knowledge, autonomy and

responsibility.” (Lury 1998)

Prosthetic limbs play a far richer role in the body-object relationship, than objects as mere

consumables, “Prosthetic limbs are extensions of the body, not distinct products to be picked up and put down,

and as such their design is more sensitive. In some ways it is the body itself that is being redesigned.” (Pullin 2009)

This process of designing for disabilities ties it all together. If designers are keenly aware of the

human body when designing anything, from toasters to chairs, the impact the designed object

will fuse with consumer’s lives is like a brightly burning candle in the designers mind. (Sharing

space of course with the ubiquitous light bulb)

“Prosthetics allow one to play with the boundary between self and not self.” (Turkle 2008)


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A Self Object occurs where the self and an object merge, in resemblance to the founding definition

of ‘prosthesis’ to add a word to the beginning of another to create a new meaning. This merging

of self and object is called 'confluence' in Gestalt therapy (Perls 1992) Gestalt therapy focuses more

on process (what is happening) than content (what is being discussed). Thus the experience

(process) of an object; the narrative formed between self and object, is more important than the

object (content) itself.“The creation of meaning is a two-way street, a creative act that involves both creator

and viewer.” (Leberecht 2010) It all boils down to the relationship between body and things, each

making the other visible.

The obsession and fascination for perfection, the seeking out for that ‘something’ which will

complete the whole; this is viewed as a positive thing. For example in Jungian philosophy, "The

more a man lays stress on false possessions, and the less sensitivity he has for what is essential, the less satisfying is

his life," (Jung 1963) Thus with this in mind, the design of objects (viewed as prostheses) are acting

as a tool, to fix, to suture, to complete the whole. The way a prosthesis is used to fix/mend a

disability, and with this knowledge, the designer can create more through mending the body, than

fixing a need.

“Writing is no longer the writing of things, or at least it is the writing of those manufactured things that are

printer’s characters… writing no longer refers to the world, to the prose of the world; it refers to the printed

volume.” (Foucault 1970)

Objects need to shift from being mere material possessions, to become a part of you, a

prosthetic. A consumer’s uptake and acceptance of objects in the crux of the argument. When

the object is viewed as a prosthesis it resemblances the way a patient takes to a transplant; “it

becomes attached, tenuously to begin with, but without doubt defiantly.” (Wills 1995)


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B I B L I O G R A P H Y

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Foster, H. (2004). Prosthetic Gods. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Foucault, M. (1970). The order of things: an archeology of the human sciences. London: Tavistock publications.

Freud, S. (1961) Civilisation and it’s discontents. New York: W. W. Norton and company limited.

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Jordan, P. W. (2000), Designing Pleasurable Products: An introduction to the new human factors. London: Taylor & Francis.

Jung, C.G. (1963) Memories, dreams, reflections. New York: Pantheon Books. Kelly, K. (2010). What technology wants. Viking Adult. Kett, W. G. (1946). Contact lenses. The Australasian Journal of Optometry. Vol 29, issue 10. Lacan, J. (1977) Ecrits: A selection. UK: Tavistock publications. Landsberg, A. (2004), Prosthetic Memory: The transformation of American remembrance in the age of mass culture. New York: Columbia University Press. Leberecht, T (2010). (Good) movies and the three dimensions of meaning. Retrieved on 24/10/10 from: http://designmind.frogdesign.com Lury, C. (1998). Prosthetic Culture photography memory and identity. London : RoutledgeMelville, S. (ed). (2005) The lure of the object. Williamstown, Mass. : Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute Mollerup, P. (2001). Collapsible. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. Nietzsche, F. (1961). Thus spoke Zarathustra. London: Penguin Books. Oxford English Dictionary Online, n.d. Web. 21/10/10 Perls, F. S. (1992). Gestalt therapy verbatim. The Gestalt Journal Press. Plath, S. (2000) The unabridged journals of Sylvia Plath 1950-1962. New York: Anchor books

Pullin, G. (2009). Design meets disability, Cambridge: MIT Press.


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Pyke, M. (1968). Food and society. London: Murray. Simon, H. (1962). The sciences of the artificial. Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press Sisario, B. (2010). When the beat came in a box. Retrieved on 17/10/10 from: http://www.nytimes.com/ Smith, M & Morra, J. (ed’s) (2006). The Prosthetic impulse: from posthuman present to a biocultural future. Cambridge: MIT Press.

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Walker, R. (2010). Consumed: Objects with back-stories. New York: NY Times, Sunday Magazine (September 5, 2010, p.18).

http://www.who.int/topics/disabilities/en/Retrieved on 20/10/10

Wills, D. (1995). Prosthesis. California: Stanford University Press.

Woods, L. (2010). Barbarism? Retrieved 10 September 2010 from: http://lebbeuswoods.wordpress.com/2010/09/10/barbarism/

Woods, L. (2010). Gehry’s Skyscraper (updated). Retrieved on 15/10/10 from: http://lebbeuswoods.wordpress.com/2010/10/11/gehrys-skyscraper/

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