Articles

Of Sex, Cylons, and Worms: A Critical Code Study of Heteronormativity


Untitled Picture (“Subtext”), Julie Levin Russo, April 2008, digital image.

LEA Volume 17 Issue 2
Senior Editors for this volume: Lanfranco Aceti and Simon Penny

ISBN: 978-1906897-16-1
ISSN: 1071-4391

Reference: Mark C. Marino, “Of Sex, Cylons, and Worms: A Critical Code Study of Heteronormativity,” eds. Lanfranco Aceti and Simon Penny, Leonardo Electronic Almanac (DAC09: After Media: Embodiment and Context) 17, no. 2 (2012): 184-201.

Of Sex, Cylons, and Worms: A Critical Code Study of Heteronormativity
by Mark Marino

When their Slash Goggles algorithm is functioning, Cylons can perceive the homoerotic sexual subtext all around them. Cylons are cybernetic organisms from the television program “Battlestar Galactica” and the “Slash Goggles” algorithm is a creative codework by Julie Levin Russo written in Zach Blas’ fictional anti-language transCoder. These are code artworks commenting on popular culture and seeking to disrupt what Blas calls the heteronormativity of computer source code. In order to seek out the heteronormativity of source code, I don these lenses for examining another piece of sexually charged code, the AnnaKournikova worm.

Full article is available for download as a pdf here.

Vol 17 Issue 2 of Leonardo Electronic Almanac (LEA) is published on line as a free PDF but will also be rolled out as Amazon Print on Demand and will be available on iTunes, iPad, Kindle and other e-publishing outlets.