Afrofuturism, Africanfuturism, and Writing Black Futures #BlackHistoryMonth
N.K. Jemisin’s first short story collection has a bracing title: “How Long ‘Till Black Future Month?” The question of black futures is the focus of afrofuturism, speculative fiction that addresses African-American concerns in the context of technology and futurism. Samuel R. Delany, Octavia Butler, and N.K. Jemisen have all been thought of as afrofuturist writers, but it was the Marvel movie Black Panther that brought some of the afrofuturist visioon to the main steam. Here’s more from The Portalist:
“Can a community whose past has been deliberately rubbed out, and whose energies have subsequently been consumed by the search for legible traces of its history, imagine possible futures? Furthermore, isn’t the unreal estate of the future already owned by the technocrats, futurologists, streamliners, and set designers ― white to a man ― who have engineered our collective fantasies? […] Speculative fiction that treats African-American themes and addresses African-American concerns in the context of twentieth-century technoculture — and, more generally, African-American signification that appropriates images of technology and a prosthetically enhanced future — might for want of a better term, be called ‘Afrofuturism.’
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
N.K. Jemisin’s first short story collection has a bracing title: “How Long ‘Till Black Future Month?” The question of black futures is the focus of afrofuturism, speculative fiction that addresses African-American concerns in the context of technology and futurism. Samuel R. Delany, Octavia Butler, and N.K. Jemisen have all been thought of as afrofuturist writers, but it was the Marvel movie Black Panther that brought some of the afrofuturist visioon to the main steam. Here’s more from The Portalist: