What does it mean “human” in the age of AI? A bibliometric evidence of posthumanism’s evolution, thematic structures, and future directions

Abstract

Purpose This study examines how posthumanist scholarship has evolved in relation to artificial intelligence (AI), with particular attention to how recent research rethinks the meaning of the “human” in digitally mediated contexts. It maps publication trends, thematic structures, and patterns of scholarly influence within posthumanism-AI research. Design/methodology/approach A systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis were conducted on peer-reviewed journal articles indexed in Scopus (2015–2025), following PRISMA 2020 guidelines. From 7,149 initial records, a multi-stage screening process retained 76 articles in which posthumanism functioned as a primary analytical framework. Intercoder reliability was confirmed (Cohen’s kappa = 0.82). Co-citation analysis, bibliographic coupling, and keyword co-occurrence analysis were performed using Bibliometrix and VOSviewer. Findings The results show a marked increase in publications after 2022, with 63.2% of the corpus published between 2023 and 2025, coinciding with the growing public visibility of generative AI. Thematic patterns indicate a shift from cyborg-oriented and human-centred perspectives toward relational understandings of human-AI interaction, distributed agency, and ethical responsibility embedded within sociotechnical and ecological contexts. While geographical participation has diversified, citation influence remains concentrated in a small number of highly cited foundational works. Originality/value This study provides a focused bibliometric synthesis of posthumanism research in which engagement with AI is theoretically central. By identifying dominant themes, intellectual foundations, and emerging orientations, it offers a data-informed interpretive framework to support future empirical and conceptual research on human-AI relations.

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