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영어

This paper explores the representation of technology and nature in Monica Hughes’s young adult science fiction (YASF). Hughes’s YASFs deal with the question of technology again and again. They admit that modern technology is partly to blame for the numerous problems humanity faces today, such as environmental damages, overpopulation, dehumanization, and others. Some of Hughes’s early works, published around 1980s in particular, reflect a general tendency in modern YASFs. Most of modern YASFs demonize technology and propose a return to nature. However, Hughes’s Isis trilogy, The Keeper of the Isis Light, The Guardian of Isis, The Isis Pedlar, questions if humanity needs to discard technology completely to restore what it has damaged. By examining an alternative community that chose a primitive agrarian lifestyle, and that banished almost all the traces of technology, the Isis trilogy claims a need for a balanced relationship between nature and technology. The Isis trilogy suggests that properly used technology can enhance the life of human beings. Unlike the majority of modern YASFs that are partly responsible for the widespread of technophobia, Hughes’s Isis trilogy presents an alternative vision for the proper relationship between nature and technology.