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Public Understanding of Science
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The Dao of human cloning: utopian/dystopian hype in the British press and popular films

Eric Jensen

Centre for Family Research and the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, University of Cambridge, UK, jensen{at}gatesscholar.org

The issue of human cloning has featured in the national science policy agendas in both the United States and the United Kingdom since the announcement in 1997 of Dolly the cloned sheep's birth in Scotland. Such news stories suggesting the imminent cloning of humans have inspired fictional entertainment media over the years, including numerous popular films. Study 1 examines elite British press coverage of human cloning from 1997 to 2004 (n = 857). Study 2 focuses on five human cloning films released between 1978 and 2003. Two sharply divergent discourses emerged from these data. Unqualified hope and habitually hyped claims of future cures permeated the press discourse. In contrast, the films constructed human cloning as an inherently dangerous technology often wielded by hubristic scientists in the tradition of Frankenstein. Both the predominately positive hype in the broadsheet press and the largely negative hype in the films indicate an impoverished and "thin" public debate on the issue of human cloning.

Public Understanding of Science, Vol. 17, No. 2, 123-143 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/0963662506065874
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This article has been cited by other articles:


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 Public Understanding of ScienceHome page
J. Kim
Public feeling for science: The Hwang affair and Hwang supporters
Public Understanding of Science, November 1, 2009; 18(6): 670 - 686.
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 Public Understanding of ScienceHome page
E. Jensen
Book review: Joan Haran, Jenny Kitzinger, Maureen McNeil, and Kate O'Riordan, Human Cloning in the Media: from Science Fiction to Science Practice (London: Routledge, 2008), 256pp, ISBN 9780415422369, $160.00 (hbk)
Public Understanding of Science, May 1, 2009; 18(3): 373 - 374.
[PDF]