Pessimistic futurism

Survival and reproduction in Octavia Butler'sDawn

Dados Bibliográficos

ID4367367
AutoresJustin Louis Mann (The George Washington University, USA, autor correspondente)
Ano2018
Volume19
Fascículo1
Páginas61-76
Data de publicação2018-04-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoFeminist Theory (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1464-7001 • E-ISSN: 1741-2773
EditoraSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1464700117742874
OpenAlexW2785882234
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas4
Referências 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