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Description
This edited collection explores representations of AI-mediated romance in popular culture as a site for religious and theological inquiry.
On a seemingly daily basis, artificial intelligence (AI) becomes further integrated into our everyday lives, appearing even in the realms of romance and romantic relationships. Amanda Furiasse and her contributors claim that AI-mediated romance ushers in a world where love and romantic affection are no longer cultivated through divine mystery or moral struggle, but optimized through algorithms and mass consumption. Across thirteen chapters, this book considers how the grand theological narratives that once anchored human desire are being rearticulated through the practices, metaphors, and emotional infrastructures of digital life. This volume challenges the common assumption that technology erodes or undermines religious meaning and seeks to demonstrate that stories of human-AI intimacy envision futures where technology and religious meaning coexist in new and transformative ways. Examining films, television, literature, and digital narratives, Furiasse and her contributors query how popular media negotiates AI-mediated intimacies between humans and machines, arguing that stories of AI romance rearticulate, contest, and transform major religious questions.
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Table of Contents
Part I - Embodiment, Personhood, and Posthuman Theologies
1: Artificial Love and the Mormon Theology of Physicality in Orson Scott Card's Enderverse, Adam McLain (University of Connecticut, USA)
2: The Essence of Love Is Pain: NieR: Automata, Incarnation, and East-Asian Theology in a Posthuman World, Mark Nam (St. John the Evangelist, Diocese of Oxford, UK)
3: Of Love, Grief, and Healing: Posthuman Affective Empathy in Kowarekake no Orgel and Hal, Ananya Saha (Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, India)
4: Love as Lifeforce: Posthuman Spirituality in Ex Machina and Westworld, Joanna Pascoe (Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand)
Part II - Creation, Control, and the Ethics of Artificial Love
5: Go Forth and Matrix-Multiply: The Promises and Problems of Artificial Procreation, Walter Barta (College of the Mainland, Houston, Texas, USA)
6: Retiring the Replicated Subject, Instrumental Rationality Critique in Blade Runner, John McDowell (Yarra Theological Union, University of Divinity, Melbourne, Australia)
7: The AI/Doll versus the Icon: Love and Reflexive Idolatry in Gekidol and Ave Mujica, Leo Chu ( University of New South Wales, Australia)
Part III - Algorithmic Desire and the Moral Economies of Affection
8: “Made for Me”: Perfect Service and Imperfect Love in AI Science Fiction, Robert Grant Price (University of Toronto Mississauga, Canada)
9: Designing Digital Love: Animation, AI Tools, and the Ethics of Emotional Simulation, Muqeem Khan (Aga Khan University School of Arts and Sciences, Pakistan)
10: Queer Futures and AI in Black Mirror's “San Junipero," Ying Ma (Nova Southeastern University, USA)
Part IV - Divine Love, Machinic Devotion, and Sacrificial Care
11: What can the Gospels-and a Tiger Nannybot named Pounce-Teach us About Parental Unconditional Love?, Peter Admirand (Dublin City University, Ireland)
12: ''Mister, how do you make children?'' Sex, Love, and Simulation among the Machines of Nier: Automata, Frank Bosman (Tilburg University, The Netherlands)
13: Longing for the Divine Other: AI Romance, Emotional Authenticity, and Posthuman Spirituality in Blade Runner 2049, Her, and Ich bin dein Mensch, Andrea Guiati (SUNY - Buffalo State University, USA)
Product details
| Published | 21 Jan 2027 |
|---|---|
| Format | Ebook (Epub & Mobi) |
| Edition | 1st |
| Pages | 325 |
| ISBN | 9798765153956 |
| Imprint | Bloomsbury Academic |
| Series | Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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