Pessimistic futurism

Survival and reproduction in Octavia Butler'sDawn

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4367367
AutoresJustin Louis Mann (The George Washington University, USA, autor de correspondencia)
Año2018
Volumen19
Número1
Páginas61-76
Fecha de publicación2018-04-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaFeminist Theory (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1464-7001 • E-ISSN: 1741-2773
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1464700117742874
OpenAlexW2785882234
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas4
Referencias citadas30

This article examines the critical work of Octavia Butler's speculative fiction novel Dawn, which follows Lilith Ayapo, a black American woman who is rescued by an alien species after a nuclear war destroys nearly all life on Earth. Lilith awakens 250 years later and learns that the aliens have tasked her with reviving other humans and repopulating the planet. In reframing Reagan-era debates about security and survival, Butler captured the spirit of 'pessimistic futurism', a unique way of thinking and writing black female sexuality, reproduction and survival. Suturing concepts central to both Afro-pessimism and Afrofuturism, pessimistic futurism carefully considers how black female subjectivity and labour create the coming world. By linking human survival to Lilith's own ability to adapt to the new and dangerous world, Butler offers scholars of black studies a vital interpretive framework for thinking about the points of contact between pessimism and futurism. Specifically, Butler presents a form of futurism brought back to Earth, grounded in the sensibility of the black female experience

Aesthetics · Art · Biology · Cognitive reframing · Epistemology · Human sexuality · Literature · Pessimism · Psychoanalysis · Reproduction · Sensibility · Sociology · Subjectivity · Gender Studies · Gothic Literature and Media Analysis · History · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology · Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life · Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction