The Black Speculative Arts Movement

Black Futurity, Art+Design

Edited by Reynaldo Anderson and Clinton R. Fluker - Foreword by Sheree Renée Thomas - Contributions by Reynaldo Anderson; Souleymane Ba; Wriply Marie Bennet; Iain Campbell; Enrique Carrion; Dariel Cobb; Tim Fielder; Clinton R. Fluker; Sherese Francis; John Jennings; Amber Johnson; Jessi Jumanji; Natasha A. Kelly; Sheeba Maya; Susana M. Morris; Dike Okoro; Rasheeda Phillips; Stacey Robinson; Erik Steinskog; Toniesha L. Taylor; Ebony A. Utley; tobias c. van Veen and Quentin VerCetty

The Black Speculative Arts Movement: Black Futurity, Art+Design is a 21^st century statement on the intersection of the future of African people with art, culture, technology, and politics. This collection enters the global debate on the emerging field of Afrofuturism studies with an international array of scholars and artists contributing to the discussion of Black futurity in the 21^st century. The contributors analyze and respond to the invisibility or mischaracterization of Black people in the popular imagination, in science fiction, and in philosophies of history.

Lexington Books

Pages: 214 • Trim: 6½ x 9¼

978-1-4985-1053-0 • Hardback • November 2019 • $123.00 • (£95.00)

978-1-4985-1055-4 • Paperback • March 2021 • $44.99 • (£35.00)

978-1-4985-1054-7 • eBook • November 2019 • $42.50 • (£35.00)

Subjects: Social Science / Popular Culture, Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural, Social Science / Ethnic Studies / African American Studies, Social Science / Future Studies, Social Science / Media Studies

The Black Speculative Arts Movement

Black Futurity, Art+Design

Hardback

Paperback

eBook

Summary

The Black Speculative Arts Movement: Black Futurity, Art+Design is a 21^st century statement on the intersection of the future of African people with art, culture, technology, and politics. This collection enters the global debate on the emerging field of Afrofuturism studies with an international array of scholars and artists contributing to the discussion of Black futurity in the 21^st century. The contributors analyze and respond to the invisibility or mischaracterization of Black people in the popular imagination, in science fiction, and in philosophies of history.

Details

Lexington Books

Pages: 214 • Trim: 6½ x 9¼

978-1-4985-1053-0 • Hardback • November 2019 • $123.00 • (£95.00)

978-1-4985-1055-4 • Paperback • March 2021 • $44.99 • (£35.00)

978-1-4985-1054-7 • eBook • November 2019 • $42.50 • (£35.00)

Subjects: Social Science / Popular Culture, Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural, Social Science / Ethnic Studies / African American Studies, Social Science / Future Studies, Social Science / Media Studies

Author

Reynaldo Anderson is associate professor of communications and chair of the Humanities Department at Harris-Stowe State University.

Clinton R. Fluker is assistant director of engagement and scholarship at the Atlanta University Center.

Table of Contents

Forward: 25 Years in a 500 Year Long Song

Sheree Renee Thomas

Introduction: The Year of the Panther

Reynaldo Anderson and Clinton Fluker

Part I: Theory and Extra-Planetary Reason

Chapter One: At the End of “Dasein”: An Afro-German Voyage into the Future

Natasha A. Kelly

Chapter Two: Avant-Gardes, Afrofuturism, and Philosophical Readings of Rhythm

Iain Campbell

Chapter Three: Working on the Other Side of Time: An Interview with Rasheedah Phillips

Reynaldo Anderson

Chapter Four: We Speak, We Make, We Tinker: Afrofuturism as Applied Digital Humanities

Toniesha L. Taylor

Chapter Five: Forms of Future/Past: Black Kirby Afrofuturism and the Visual Technologies of Resistance

John Jennings and Clinton R. Fluker

Part II: Coding Utopia and Dystopia

Chapter Six: “Everything is real. It’s just not as you see it”: Imagination, Utopia, and Afrofuturist Feminism in Octavia E. Butler’s “The Book of Martha”

Susana M. Morris

Chapter Seven: African Futurist Themes and Fantasy in Modern African Speculative Fiction

Dike Okoro

Chapter Eight: B[l]ack to the Future: Futurism and Blackness in Zone One

Souleymane Ba

Chapter Nine: Dragons, Vescells, and Writing Afro-Latino Futures: An Interview with Enrique Carrion

Stacey Robinson

Chapter Ten: “The Electric Impulse:” The Legba Circuit in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man

Sherese Francis

Part III: Blackness and Planetary Praxis

Chapter Eleven: Ashes to Ashes: The Second Life of Kiluanji Kia Henda’s Afrofuturist Critique

Dariel Cobb

Chapter Twelve: Metropolis 2.0: Janelle Monáe’s Recycling of Fritz Lang

Erik Steinskog

Chapter Thirteen: Designing Love: Reimagining Technology and Intimacy

Ebony A. Utley

Chapter Fourteen: Performing Black Imagination: The Critical Embodiment of Transfuturism

Amber Johnson

Chapter Fifteen: Fabulous Camps of the Black Fantastic: Sylvester James, Queer Afrofuturism, and Black Vernacular Becomings

tobias c. van Veen and Reynaldo Anderson

Part IV: Images on the Other Side of Time

Chapter Sixteen: Funky Images on the Other Side of Time: Various Artists

Wriply Marie Bennet, Tim Fielder, John Jennings, Jessi Jumanji, Amber Johnson, Sheeba Maya, Stacey Robinson, and Quentin VerCetty

Reviews

This creative and courageous book is the flowering of black imagination and exploration into alternatives to the catastrophic realities of present-day black life. It is part of a great tradition of theory and praxis, thought and action rooted in concrete struggles for black freedom and black joy! As America and much of the world moves toward neo-fascism, Afro-futurism becomes more timely and powerful!
— Cornel West, Harvard University

Reynaldo Anderson and Clinton R. Fluker have continued a dynamic dance with Afrofuturism, bringing together the giants of the field in a single volume. The authors in this well-anchored volume are the best in the field. Each has made an outstanding contribution to Afrofuturism by rushing quickly into the future. I contend that The Black Speculative Arts Movement: Black Futurity, Art+Design by virtue of its comprehensive and authorial nature will become the classic in the field.
— Molefi Kete Asante, professor and chair, Department of Africology, Temple University, author of The History of Africa