The Origins of the Cinematic Cyborg

The article considers the figure of the cyborg in television and films in the period between 1960 and 1984. Those years cover the period after the word was coined but precedes the so-called Cyborg Cinema—which has its symbol in Terminator—and a new understanding of the concept triggered by the theoretical discourses of Donna Haraway and the fictional account of William Gibson’s cyberspace. In this article, I discuss four different senses of “cyborg” resuming previous studies: the original proposition, the bionic or enhanced man, the killer android, and the metaphorical one. Then, I look at shows and movies that used the word “cyborg” before 1984 in order to understand what was intended by it and which themes, issues and narratives were raised, thus complementing an incomplete genealogy of such a meaningful character and its challenge of human boundaries.