The Black Speculative Arts Movement

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! -- Cornell West, Harvard University Reynaldo Anderson has continued his 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, Temple University

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.

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 Monae'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