“Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell: Summary and Critique

Introduction: “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell

Table of Contents

“Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell first appeared in 2001 in the Humboldt Journal of Social Relations (Vol. 26, Nos. 1/2, pp. 154–173), a double issue published by the Department of Sociology, Humboldt State University, and preserved via JSTOR. In this essay, Campbell argues that Haraway’s famous “cyborg manifesto” functions less as a socialist-feminist rupture than as a legitimating myth for the United States’ technoscientific civil religion—relocating “salvation” from grace or liberation to the embrace of a hybrid world where boundaries between human/animal, organism/machine, and physical/non-physical dissolve (Campbell 2001, 154–156, 160–164). He reads Haraway’s “ironic political myth” and stance of “blasphemy” as rhetorically dazzling yet complicit with techno-optimism, ultimately making the cyborg a carrier of a new salvation history rather than an escape from it (Campbell 2001, 155–166). By situating Haraway against broader debates on civil religion, technological mysticism, and redemptive technology (e.g., Wuthnow; Stahl), Campbell’s article is important to literature and literary theory because it reframes posthumanist imagery and feminist technoscience not merely as cultural critique but as theology-laden narrative—showing how figurative constructs (myth, irony, trope) mediate power, belief, and the sacred within late-modern discourse (Campbell 2001, 166–169, 171–173).

Summary of “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell

✦ Haraway’s Cyborg as Political Myth

Campbell argues that Haraway frames the cyborg as an “ironic political myth” faithful to feminism, socialism, and materialism, but also as blasphemy within U.S. civil religion traditions (Haraway, 1985:65; Campbell, 2001, p. 156).
Myth here functions as a legitimating narrative—a worldview that provides coherence and authority (Campbell, 2001, pp. 156–157).

✦ Blasphemy vs. Apostasy

Haraway adopts the stance of the blasphemer (insider critic), not the apostate (outsider), to challenge dominant religious-political traditions while still working within them (Campbell, 2001, pp. 157–158).
This position acknowledges the pervasive American civil religion that merges Christianity with national identity (Campbell, 2001, p. 158).

✦ Irony as Strategy and Its Limits

Haraway employs irony as “humor and serious play”, but Campbell critiques this as rhetorical ambiguity that risks misinterpretation and undermines her critique (Haraway, 1985:65; Campbell, 2001, pp. 158–159).

Instead of subverting technological civil religion, her irony may inadvertently affirm it (Campbell, 2001, p. 159).

✦ Technology as Civil Religion

Campbell, drawing on Wuthnow, argues that technology has replaced older legitimating myths in American civil religion, offering tangible “this-worldly” salvation (Wuthnow, 1988:282–291; Campbell, 2001, pp. 160–161).
Haraway’s work, despite its critique, affirms this myth by grounding salvation in technoscientific progress (Campbell, 2001, pp. 161–162).

✦ Breakdown of Western Dualisms

Haraway’s cyborg challenges three key dualisms:
1. Human/Animal – rejecting human exceptionalism (Haraway, 1985:68).
2. Organism/Machine – merging biology and technology (Haraway, 1985:99).
3. Physical/Non-physical – integrating spirituality with technoscience (Haraway, 1985:70; Campbell, 2001, pp. 162–164).
Campbell argues these dissolutions lead to a holistic “cyborg salvation history” (p. 164).

✦ Cyborg as Carrier of Salvation History

The cyborg is not outside history but becomes the “carrier” of salvation history, embodying humanity’s hopes through technology (Campbell, 2001, p. 164).
Unlike Christian salvation rooted in divine grace, Haraway’s is a technological soteriology—salvation through technoscience (Campbell, 2001, pp. 164–165).

✦ Haraway’s Religious Language

Haraway borrows heavily from religious tropes such as witnessing, blasphemy, and salvation (Haraway, 1997:47, 120; Campbell, 2001, pp. 164–166).

Campbell notes parallels to biblical narratives (e.g., Babel, Pentecost) in her use of “speaking in tongues” (Haraway, 1985:101; Campbell, 2001, p. 165).

✦ Cyborg Myth as Techno-Optimism

Campbell critiques Haraway for reinforcing a techno-celebratory worldview, where technology itself becomes the site of redemption (Campbell, 2001, pp. 166–168).
Scholars such as Hochman and Stahl similarly argue that Haraway’s utopian vision downplays the environmental and capitalist costs of technology (Campbell, 2001, pp. 168–169).

✦ Future of Religion: Techno-Mysticism

The cyborg embodies a fusion of science and religion, creating a technological mysticism or implicit religion of technology (Stahl, 1999:13; Campbell, 2001, pp. 167–169).
Salvation is redefined as becoming light, energy, and signals—a new civil religion of technoscience (Haraway, 1985:70; Campbell, 2001, p. 169).

✦ Final Claim: No Postmodern Reality

Campbell concludes that Haraway’s work, despite its postmodern rhetoric, offers no real rupture—“the stark reality about postmodern reality is that there is no such thing” (Campbell, 2001, p. 169).

Theoretical Terms/Concepts in “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell

Term / Concept	Explanation	Reference
✦ Cyborg salvation history	Campbell’s central term: the cyborg becomes the “carrier” of salvation, shifting hope from divine grace or liberation politics to technoscientific becoming.	“The cyborg is not outside salvation history; the cyborg is the ultimate ‘carrier’ of that history” (Campbell, 2001, p. 164).
✶ Ironic political myth	Haraway frames her manifesto as an ironic myth; Campbell critiques irony as rhetorical play that risks reinforcing what it critiques.	“Haraway indicates that her work is to be seen as an ‘ironic political myth’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 156).
✹ Blasphemy (vs. apostasy)	Haraway adopts the stance of insider-critic (“blasphemer”) rather than outsider (“apostate”), working within U.S. civil religion.	“Blasphemy is not apostasy… the blasphemer is an insider acting as critic” (Campbell, 2001, p. 157).
✪ Legitimating myth	Haraway’s cyborg functions as a legitimating myth—a worldview giving coherence to technoscience and politics.	“Evidence… warrants a more complex interpretation of myth as ‘legitimating myth’ or ‘plausibility structure’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 156).
❂ Civil religion (technological)	Technology replaces Christianity/nationalism as America’s sacred myth; Haraway’s rhetoric affirms this new civil religion.	“Haraway’s work… offers further legitimation for the technological myth that undergirds the civil religion of the United States” (Campbell, 2001, p. 154).
⚙︎ Technoscience	The fused domain of science and technology grounds Haraway’s cyborg and salvation narrative.	“Her ‘mutant modest witness’… will live in a world of technoscience” (Campbell, 2001, p. 162).
☍ Crisis of legitimation	Post-WWII myths of American supremacy falter; technology steps in as new legitimating myth.	“A ‘crisis of legitimation’… the old myths that maintained the perception of American supremacy no longer seem plausible” (Campbell, 2001, p. 160).
⇄ Breakdown of dualisms	Haraway dissolves human/animal, organism/machine, and physical/non-physical binaries.	“Haraway’s manifesto is based on the breakdown of three traditional (modern Western) boundaries” (Campbell, 2001, p. 162).
✥ Cyborg as image / carrier	The cyborg is a rhetorical and historical figure embodying salvation within technoscience.	“The cyborg… becomes part of the ‘natural’ order… the ultimate ‘carrier’ of that history” (Campbell, 2001, p. 164).
☼ New monotheism of light/signals	Salvation is reimagined as energy, signals, and immanence of technoscience.	“This is a new monotheism, where matter and energy, body and spirit collapse into light” (Campbell, 2001, p. 169).
♲ Technological mysticism	Faith in universal efficacy of technology operates as hidden religion.	“Stahl describes… ‘technological mysticism,’ a ‘faith in the universal efficacy of technology’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 167).
✧ Redemptive technology vs. techno-optimism	Campbell contrasts humane ideals of justice/limits with Haraway’s techno-celebration.	“Haraway… wields this sexy metaphor to sell the dated agenda of techno-optimism” (Campbell, 2001, p. 166).
✢ Modest witness	Haraway’s self-description embeds religious language of witnessing and salvation in technoscience.	“Haraway… would like to see her ‘mutant modest witness’… live in a world of technoscience” (Campbell, 2001, p. 162).
✎ Speaking in tongues / heteroglossia	Haraway invokes biblical language of tongues to describe transgressive rhetoric.	“Blasphemers can strike fear… by adopting a ‘powerful infidel heteroglossia’ and ‘speaking in tongues’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 165).
☵ Spiral dance / dialectic	A metaphor for life evolving through constructive/destructive interplay, linked to DNA.	“Haraway also argues… bound up in the ‘spiral dance’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 165).
∞ Grand narrative / theory of everything	Haraway, despite anti-metanarrative stance, produces a universal salvation story through the cyborg.	“In pursuing a postmodern aversion… Haraway stumbled into the grandest narrative of all” (Grassie, cited in Campbell, 2001, p. 167).
⊙ Immanentism / holism	Transcendence replaced by an immanent, holistic order mediated by technoscience.	“Our concept of self should incorporate a new naturalism, a new holism, and a new immanentism” (Campbell, 2001, p. 161).
✕ No ‘postmodern reality’	Campbell’s verdict: Haraway’s rhetoric offers no rupture—postmodern reality does not exist.	“The stark reality about ‘postmodern reality’ is that there is no such thing” (Campbell, 2001, p. 169).

Contribution of “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell to Literary Theory/Theories

✦ Poststructuralism & Deconstruction

Campbell situates Haraway’s manifesto within the feminist post-structuralist critique of science, noting her challenge to universal, totalizing theories (Crewe, 1997; Campbell, 2001, p. 155).
By highlighting Haraway’s use of irony and myth, Campbell demonstrates how rhetorical strategies deconstruct binaries and destabilize meaning, yet paradoxically risk reinforcing dominant ideologies (Campbell, 2001, pp. 158–159).
This reflects a poststructuralist concern with language, ambiguity, and the limits of representation.

✶ Feminist Literary Theory

Haraway’s cyborg is read as a feminist icon challenging gender essentialism and the myth of human exceptionalism (Haraway, 1985:68; Campbell, 2001, pp. 162–163).
Campbell critiques how Haraway frames the cyborg as both emancipatory and as complicit with techno-optimism, exposing tensions within feminist theory between critique and complicity (Campbell, 2001, p. 166).
Contribution: highlights how feminist theory can be both critical and vulnerable to ideological capture by dominant technoscientific narratives.

❂ Myth Criticism & Religious Studies in Literature

Campbell interprets Haraway’s “cyborg” as a legitimating myth akin to religious salvation history (Campbell, 2001, p. 156).
He frames her rhetoric of blasphemy, witnessing, and salvation as continuations of biblical/mythic patterns transposed into technoscience (Campbell, 2001, pp. 157–165).
Contribution: situates literary/mythic tropes as crucial in understanding how technoscience inherits theological functions.

⚙︎ Cultural Studies & Civil Religion

Campbell argues Haraway’s work legitimates the civil religion of technology in U.S. culture, transforming salvation into a technoscientific project (Campbell, 2001, pp. 154–160).
By reading Haraway alongside Wuthnow and Stahl, Campbell places the cyborg within cultural narratives of progress and national destiny (Campbell, 2001, pp. 160–169).
Contribution: expands cultural studies by showing how literature and theory participate in national mythmaking through religious-technological metaphors.

☍ Science, Technology, and Literature (STS & Technocriticism)

Campbell underscores how Haraway collapses the boundaries between human/animal, organism/machine, and physical/non-physical (Campbell, 2001, pp. 162–164).
He critiques her cyborg as embodying a technological mysticism, reinforcing rather than dismantling technoscientific authority (Campbell, 2001, pp. 167–169).
Contribution: advances technocriticism in literary studies by framing literature and theory as implicated in the cultural legitimation of science and technology.

✥ Utopian/Dystopian Literary Theory

Haraway’s cyborg offers a utopian vision of a post-gender, post-dualist world (Campbell, 2001, pp. 162–163).
Campbell critiques this as “techno-celebratory” and insufficiently attentive to environmental and capitalist costs (Campbell, 2001, pp. 166–168).
Contribution: complicates utopian studies by showing how utopian tropes can legitimize existing technological orders instead of disrupting them.

Examples of Critiques Through “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell

Novel	Critique through Campbell’s Framework	Reference from Campbell
✦ Klara and the Sun (Kazuo Ishiguro, 2021)	Ishiguro’s AI narrator embodies the cyborg as carrier of salvation history, where faith in technoscience replaces divine grace. Like Haraway’s cyborg, Klara mediates between machine and spiritual hope, but Campbell would caution that this risks becoming a legitimating myth of techno-optimism rather than critique.	“The cyborg is not outside salvation history; the cyborg is the ultimate ‘carrier’ of that history” (Campbell, 2001, p. 164).
✶ Machines Like Me (Ian McEwan, 2019)	McEwan’s android protagonist reflects the civil religion of technology, where technological beings embody moral dilemmas. Campbell’s lens suggests that rather than dismantling human/machine binaries, such narratives reinforce technology’s mythic status as a new foundation of belief.	“Haraway’s work… offers further legitimation for the technological myth that undergirds the civil religion of the United States” (Campbell, 2001, p. 154).
❂ Sea of Tranquility (Emily St. John Mandel, 2022)	Mandel’s time-travel and simulation motifs echo Haraway’s collapse of physical/non-physical boundaries. Campbell would read this as part of a techno-mystical worldview where salvation is relocated to data and signals, aligning with a new monotheism of light.	“This is a new monotheism, where matter and energy, body and spirit collapse into light” (Campbell, 2001, p. 169).
⚙︎ The Candy House (Jennifer Egan, 2022)	Egan’s networked consciousness recalls Haraway’s spiral dance/heteroglossia, where multiple voices and selves intertwine. Campbell’s critique would stress the risk of technological mysticism—a hidden religion of connectivity—rather than liberation from power.	“Stahl describes… ‘technological mysticism,’ a ‘faith in the universal efficacy of technology’” (Campbell, 2001, p. 167).

Criticism Against “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell

✦ Overemphasis on Religious Framework
Campbell reads Haraway primarily through the lens of salvation history and civil religion, which may oversimplify her engagement with feminist, socialist, and postmodern theory. This risks reducing her complex rhetorical strategies to theology alone (Campbell, 2001, pp. 154–157).
✶ Neglect of Feminist Political Stakes
His critique sometimes sidelines Haraway’s feminist and socialist commitments, framing her cyborg more as a myth that legitimates technoscience than as a political tool for resistance (Campbell, 2001, pp. 162–166).
❂ Irony Misinterpreted as Weakness
Campbell treats Haraway’s ironic method as undermining clarity and responsibility, but many theorists argue irony is precisely her strength—a deliberate rhetorical strategy to resist totalizing discourse (Campbell, 2001, pp. 158–159).

⚙︎ Techno-Deterministic Reading
By arguing that Haraway inadvertently reinforces techno-optimism, Campbell risks overstating determinism, ignoring how Haraway uses the cyborg as a political fiction rather than a literal endorsement of technology (Campbell, 2001, pp. 166–168).
☍ Limited Engagement with Literary Dimensions
Although the article appears in a journal of social relations, Campbell focuses on sociology and religion. His reading underplays how Haraway’s cyborg operates as a literary trope and cultural metaphor, thus missing contributions to narrative and myth analysis (Campbell, 2001, pp. 156–164).
✥ Conflation of Critique with Complicity
Campbell argues Haraway is “victim of her own ironic myth,” but this conflates critical complicity (a strategy of working within contradictions) with ideological surrender (Campbell, 2001, p. 159).

☼ Dismissal of Postmodern Pluralism
His conclusion that “the stark reality about postmodern reality is that there is no such thing” dismisses Haraway’s pluralist, situated knowledge project too quickly, potentially misreading her anti-foundational politics (Campbell, 2001, p. 169).

Representative Quotations from “Cyborg Salvation History: Donna Haraway And The Future Of Religion” By Robert A. Campbell with Explanation

Quotation (with symbol)	Explanation	Page / Context
🟣 “The cyborg is not outside salvation history; the cyborg is the ultimate ‘carrier’ of that history.”	Campbell’s central thesis: Haraway’s cyborg doesn’t abolish salvation narratives—it embodies them within technoscience, relocating hope from theology to technology.	p. 164
🔶 “Haraway’s work… offers further legitimation for the technological myth that undergirds the civil religion of the United States.”	He argues Haraway’s rhetoric reinforces a national myth of technological destiny (civil religion), rather than subverting it.	p. 154
🟢 “Haraway indicates that her work is to be seen as an ‘ironic political myth’.”	Signals Campbell’s focus on irony as Haraway’s method; he later critiques how irony can blur accountability and stabilize what it seeks to unsettle.	p. 156
🔵 “Blasphemy is not apostasy…” (Campbell glosses) “the blasphemer is an insider acting as critic.”	Campbell frames Haraway’s stance as insider dissent within U.S. civil-religious discourse—provocative but still within the tradition.	p. 157
🟠 “Some readers may be dazzled—even overwhelmed—by Haraway’s use of irony, but… [she] unwittingly becomes the unintended victim of her own word play.”	His sharpest stylistic critique: Haraway’s irony risks undermining her critique by enabling misreadings and unintended legitimation.	p. 159
🟡 “Haraway’s manifesto is based on the breakdown of three traditional (modern Western) boundaries… [human/animal, organism/machine, physical/non-physical].”	Campbell outlines Haraway’s anti-dualist program; he later argues its cultural effect is to naturalize technoscience.	p. 162
🟤 “This is a new monotheism, where matter and energy, body and spirit collapse into light.”	Campbell’s striking metaphor for technological mysticism: the sacred becomes signals/energy, sacralizing technoscience.	p. 169
🔺 “The cyborg myth is not merely a thought experiment… rather, it is a legitimation myth.”	He recasts Haraway’s figure as a worldview-maintaining story—supporting existing techno-social orders, not overthrowing them.	p. 166
💠 “A ‘crisis of legitimation’… the old myths that maintained the perception of American supremacy no longer seem plausible.”	Historical backdrop: as older national myths falter, technology steps in as the new source of legitimacy.	p. 160
🌈 “The stark reality about ‘postmodern reality’ is that there is no such thing.”	Campbell’s verdict: despite postmodern gestures, Haraway’s project doesn’t deliver a real break from modernity’s technological faith.	p. 169