Special Relativity, Real-Time Communications, and Vulnerability in Outer Space and Lauren James's The Loneliest Girl in the Universe

Aliaga-Lavrijsen, Jessica

En : Transmodern Literatures in the 21st Century Of(f) Limits
2025
Routledge London ; New York
ISBN: 978-1-041-06789-4
Pp: 111-128

Abstract: It is evident that technology has changed the way we communicate and that our experience of time has also shifted in the last century. In her feminist science-fiction novel The Loneliest Girl in the Universe (2017), Lauren James tackles topics such as the impact of the supremacy of technology in the realm of human communication in Transmodernity and in space travel, as well as the transmissibility of digital information and what Rodríguez Magda has termed “static connectivity” (2004 and 2017)—which refers to new forms of relation and online interactions in which individuals relate to others without completely leaving their isolation. The aim of this chapter is twofold: first, it will examine how the novel’s innovative generic features—a space opera combining emails, fan fiction, diary entries as well as more traditional narration—invite readers to reflect on the nature of both delayed and instant messaging/real-time communication and the subjective nature of space–time in interstellar space travel, which inevitably transgresses our conventional spatial and temporal human limits. And second, the analysis of the novel will show how, despite universal longing for communication and connection, truth and real communication can be obscured even more by the mediation of technology, as it is not immune to the workings of power relationships. As the story reveals, it becomes clear that instantaneity or the transmissibility of information in real time is not the outcome of the creation of an ideal and global democratic network in which all the parts have equal power. Moreover, vulnerability is one of the key characteristics of the transmodern human beings who are trying to find a new planet in which future life could thrive. In short, James’s feminist approach to all these topics reveals that “static connectivity” cannot overlook the vulnerability present in all forms of relationality and that gender relationships and equality are still issues to be considered and to be fought for.

Nota: Postprint. Research for this article was funded by MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER, EU) (code PID2021-124841NB-I00), together with the Government of Aragón and the European Social Fund (ESF) (code H03_23R).

DOI: 10.4324/9781003637097-9