Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy Culture

by Ytasha L. Womack

  “I opened the workshop by asking them what was their favorite sci-fi-themed book or TV show,” says Phillips. “I asked them to tell me in one sentence how they saw their future or what they thought would happen a hundred years from now.” Then she talked about racism in science fiction and how they felt about not seeing their image in media. “They were so into it,” she says. “They really schooled me, and in terms of breaking down core concepts, they were on top of it.”

  Next Phillips talked about breaking cycles and looking to the past and present to identify patterns that no longer worked in their life. She used the metaphor of a time machine and asked what they would change in their life. “They really connected with that aspect,” she says. “They really liked discussing their past and how to change the patterns and cycles and work to build a future.”

  While I was doing research for this book, family friends and art collectors Linda and Leonard Murray suggested that I take a look at the poster art created by MacArthur Fellow Kerry James Marshall for the African Festival of the Arts. The festival is a robust extravaganza held each year in Chicago’s Washington Park and is produced by Africa International House. The Murrays work with the festival each year and when they learned I was working in Afrofuturism, they figured that Marshall’s commissioned work would be up my cosmic alley. When I asked what the poster depicted, they had a difficult time explaining it, but in short described the work as the “Black Jetsons.”

  I rushed over to their home to take a look, and the poster was pretty amazing, to say the least. It highlighted a loving family of four living in a space station decked out in African art with a snazzy, to-die-for panoramic view of the Milky Way out their living room window. The kids, a young boy and girl, are seated on a sofa studying Earth via a hologram that hovers over their coffee table. The parents are both in African-accented garb. The father with long dreads playfully wraps his arms around the mother, who is sporting a large head wrap. The family are art collectors as well, and this cozy space pad is decorated with Dogon masks and Yoruba sky art along with a healthy spread of plants. This far-out family moment was one of a kind. Marshall named it Keeping the Culture.

  After learning about the poster, I was invited by Africa International House president Patrick Saingbey Woodtor and art dealer John A. Martin to discuss Afrofuturism and how Keeping the Culture fit into the aesthetic before a group of art collectors. Afterward, participants, most of whom were unfamiliar with the term, were taken by the futurism and culture in the piece. To my surprise, they were also inspired to share personal stories of their own; true stories of futuristic technologies they’d witnessed long before they hit the market, family stories of time travel, or unique ideas they had on space travel and critical technologies they wanted to invent. Some debated whether the hovering image of Earth was indeed a hologram or a time travel portal. These unassuming crowds of collectors were bound in their Afro-surreal cultural ties to technology and the imagination, a realization triggered by Keeping the Culture and having Afrofuturism defined.

  Marshall is one of the great artists of our times, and his works are housed in the top collections and museums around the world, including the Smithsonian. At one point, Marshall says his aim was to create as many quality works with black people as possible and to have them posted in the far corners of the world. His success, with his works featured globally, has done just that. But for Keeping the Culture, Marshall challenged the conventions about the future. “I just thought it would be interesting to link the idea of the historical past with black people and the diaspora but also look at how that past can be carried along with the people who are evolving toward the future,” he says. He purposely combined traditional African art tied to the sky and mysticism along with holograms and space stations, to bridge the idea of an African origin with the transference of culture and family values into a space-friendly future. “It struck me that you rarely see images of black people projecting themselves into the future. When you do, it’s almost always the post-apocalyptic type of future where the person is very isolated.”

  Marshall believes contemplating the future is important. “It comes down to do we really imagine ourselves to be in the future? And if we imagine ourselves into the future, how are we going to be when we get there?” he asks. “Can we be agents of the future or will we be objects of the future, like we were objects of commerce when black folks were brought to the New World?” He’s an advocate of the strategic use of the imagination and urges Afrofuturists to ponder how they can have a collective technological advantage that helps shape the world and alleviate disparity. We must be “in front of the developing of the material realities that shape the future,” he says. The influencers of the future aren’t those who create the next high-profile phone, but rather those who determine whether we’ll be using phones in the first place, he adds.

  Afrofuturism is a great tool for wielding the imagination for personal change and societal growth. Empowering people to see themselves and their ideas in the future gives rise to innovators and free thinkers, all of whom can pull from the best of the past while navigating the sea of possibilities to create communities, culture, and a new, balanced world. The imagination is the key to progress, and it’s the imagination that is all too often smothered in the name of conformity and community standards.

  On the one hand, Afrofuturism encourages the beauties of African diasporic cultures and gives people of color a face in the future. But from a global vantage point, the perspective contributes to world knowledge and ideas and includes the perspectives of a group too often deleted from the past and future. Sometimes Afrofuturists address otherness dead-on, while some simply give life to the stories that dance in their mind. But all are aware that the future, technology, and the scope of the imagination have unlimited potential that culture can inform.

  Yet the inequities that plagued the past and play out in the present cannot be carried into the future. Afrofuturism provides a prism for examining this issue through art and discourse, but it’s a prism that is not exclusive to the diaspora alone. Whether by adopting the aesthetic or the principles, all people can find inspiration or practical use for Afrofuturism to both transform their world and break free of their own set of limitations. The myths of the Dogon or the stories of Samuel Delany can and do enrich lives all over the world. The musical approaches of DJ Spooky or the Black Kirby art show provide the cognitive dissonance that many need to rewire their limited view of the world. Good ideas transcend time, space, and culture. To quote the film V for Vendetta, ideas are bulletproof.

  While teaching yoga to a group of fifth-grade African American girls, for some reason I brought up the rover on Mars. I talked about space tourism and asked how many would be willing to take a ride. All hands shot up. One said she was going to ask her mom to start saving money so they could buy a ticket. Today the tickets are around ninety thousand dollars. But one day, not too far off, the prices will go down, space tourism will be commonplace, and the fact that we lived in a time when it was not will sound like we lived in the age of the dinosaurs when we retell it. Perhaps this young girl, inspired by space travel, will create the latest flying car upgrade. Or maybe, as she’s mapping out her Mars trip, she’ll write a story about her future, her interstellar travels, and the life force she brings to this red planet neighbor. Perhaps, with a desire to improve the world’s conditions, she’ll link into a larger group of people in a shared vision of sustainability and equality. Starting with her imagination and implementing ideas through her actions, she’ll live the future. The future is ours. Yes, the future is now.

  NOTES

  Chapter 1: Evolution of a Space Cadet

  1. Ingrid LaFleur, “Visual Aesthetics of Afrofuturism,” TEDx Fort Greene Salon, YouTube, September 25, 2011.

  Chapter 2: A Human Fairy Tale Named Black

  1. Ytasha Womack, “Dorothy Roberts Debunks Myth of Race,” Post Black Experience, http://postblackexperience.com/tag/dorothy-roberts/ (Accessed January 10, 2012).<
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  2. Kodwo Eshun, More Brilliant Than the Sun: Adventures in Sonic Fiction (UK: Quartet Books, 1998), 175.

  3. Saidiya Hartman, Lose Your Mother (New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2008).

  4. Sarah Zielinski, “Henrietta Lacks Immortal Cells,” Smithsonian Magazine, www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Henrietta-Lacks-Immortal-Cells.html (Accessed January 22, 2010).

  5. Ytasha Womack, “Dorothy Roberts Debunks Myth,” Post Black Experience, http://postblackexperience.com/tag/dorothy-roberts/ (Accessed October 17, 2011).

  6. Reynaldo Anderson, “Critical Afrofuturism: A Case Study in Visual Rhetoric, Sequential Art, and Post-Apocalyptic Black Identity” (2012).

  Chapter 3: Project Imagination

  1. Jeremy Hsu, “Former Astronaut Will Lead 100 Year Starship Effort,” Tech News Daily, www.technewsdaily.com/5774-astronaut-lead-100-year-starship.html (Accessed May 21, 2012).

  2. Center for Black Studies, “AfroGeeks: Global Blackness and the Digital Sphere,” University of California Santa Barbara, www.research.ucsb.edu/cbs/projects/afrogeeks04.html (Accessed March 1, 2012).

  3. Mark Dery, “Black to the Future,” in Flame Wars: The Discourse of Cyberculture (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), 180.

  4. Aaron Smither and Joanna Brenner, “Twitter Use 2012,” Pew Internet & American Life Project, http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2012/Twitter-Use-2012/Findings.aspx (Accessed May 31, 2012).

  Chapter 4: Mothership in the Key of Mars

  1. Amina Khan, “New will.i.am Song Transmitted from Mars Curiosity Rover,” Los Angeles Times, http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/28/science/la-sci-sn-will-i-am-curiosity-mars-rover-track-nasa-20120828 (Accessed August 28, 2012).

  2. “Will.i.am NASA Interview at Curiosity Mars Landing 2012,” YouTube, August 6, 2012.

  3. Scott T. Hill, “With Earthbound, CopperWire Creates a Soulful Sci-Fi Space Opera,” Wired, www.wired.com/underwire/2012/04/copperwire-earthbound/ (Accessed April 4, 2012).

  4. The Last Angel of History, directed by John Akomfrah (Icarus Films, 1996).

  5. Scot Hacker, “Can You Get to That: The Cosmology of P-Funk,” Stuck Between Stations, http://stuckbetweenstations.org/2011/01/11/cosmology-of-pfunk/ (January 11, 2011).

  6. Kodwo Eshun, More Brilliant Than the Sun: Adventures in Sonic Fiction (UK: Quartet Books, 1998).

  7. Eshun, More Brilliant Than the Sun.

  8. “The Ten Droid Commandments,” HollyGoCrunkly, http://hollygocrunkly.tumblr.com/post/746007554/the-ten-droid-commandments (Accessed May 10, 2012).

  Chapter 5: The African Cosmos for Modern Mermaids (Mermen)

  1. Malidoma Patrice Somé, Ritual, Magic, and Inititation in the Life of an African Shaman (New York: Penguin Group, 1995), 8.

  2. Somé, Ritual, Magic, and Initiation, 9.

  3. Hunter Hindrew and Mamaissii Vivian, “Mami Water Healers Society,” Mami Wata, www.mamiwata.com/news.html (Accessed June 5, 2012).

  4. Aker, “My-stery Images of Mami Wata,” Futuristically Ancient, http://futuristicallyancient.com/2012/04/18/the-my-stery-images-of-mami-wata (Accessed April 18, 2012).

  5. “Last Splash: Azealia Banks Explains the Whole Mermaid Deal,” Spin Magazine, www.spin.com/articles/last-splash-azealia-banks-explains-whole-mermaid-deal (Accessed July 12, 2012).

  6. “African Cosmos,” African Institute of Art, http://africa.si.edu/exhibits/cosmos/intro.html (Accessed June 1, 2012).

  7. Somé, Ritual, Magic, and Initiation, 8–9.

  Chapter 6: The Divine Feminine in Space

  1. “Martin Luther King Was a Trekkie: Star Trek and Equality,” YouTube (Accessed January 23, 2011).

  2. Matrix Reloaded, directed by Lana Wachowski and Andy Wachowski (Warner Brothers, 2003).

  3. Gillian Gus Andrews, “Janelle Monáe Turns Rhythm and Blues into Science Fiction,” I09, http://io9.com/5592174/janelle-monae-turns-rhythm-and-blues-into-science-fiction (Accessed July 21, 2010).

  4. “Grace Jones,” Elton & Jacobsen, http://eltonjacobsen.com/2008/06/22/grace-jones (Accessed April 18, 2012).

  5. KaterinaWilhelmina, “Grace Jones Quotes,” Chatterbusy Blog spot, http://chatterbusy.blogspot.com/2012/10/grace-jones-quotes.html (Accessed October 1, 2012).

  6. Jennie Ruby, “Women Only Spaces: An Alternative to Patriarchy,” Feminist Reprise, www.feminist-reprise.org/docs/womonlyspace.htm (Accessed April 22, 2012).

  7. Tempestt Hazel, “Black to the Future Series: An Interview with D. Denenge Akpem,” Sixty Inches from Center, Chicago Arts Archive, http://sixtyinchesfromcenter.org/archive/?p=16638 (Accessed July 23, 2012).

  Chapter 7: Pen My Future

  1. W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Comet,” in Dark Matter, edited by Sheree R. Thomas (2000): 5–18.

  2. Samuel R. Delany, “Racism and Science Fiction,” New York Review of Science Fiction, Issue 120, August 1998, www.nyrsf.com/racism-and-science-fiction-.html (Accessed September 1, 2012).

  3. Jess Nevins, “The Black Fantastic: Highlights of Pre World War II African and African American Speculative Fiction,” IO9. http://io9.com/5947122/the-black-fantastic-highlights-of-pre+world-war-ii-african-and-african+american-speculative-fiction (Accessed October 2, 2012).

  4. Nevins, “The Black Fantastic.”

  5. “Afrofuturism, Science Fiction and the History of the Future,” Socialism and Democracy Online, http://sdonline.org/42/Afrofuturism-science-fiction-and-the-history-of-the-future (Accessed April 20, 2012).

  6. “Afrofuturism, Science Fiction,” Socialism and Democracy Online.

  7. Mindy Farabee, “Nalo Hopkinson’s Science Fiction and Real Life Family,” Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2013, http://articles.latimes.com/2013/mar/21/entertainment/la-ca-jc-nalo-hopkinson-20130324.

  Chapter 8: Moonwalkers in Paint and Pixels

  1. Samantha Burton, “The Africa That I Know,” Bitch, http://bitch-magazine.org/article/the-africa-that-i-know (Accessed April 15, 2012).

  2. Alyx Vesey, “Bechdel Test Canon: Pumzi,” Bitch, http://bitchmagazine.org/post/bechdel-test-canon-pumzi-feminist-film-review (Accessed February 3, 2012).

  3. Tempestt Hazel, “Black to the Future Series. An Interview with Cauleen Smith,” Sixty Inches from Center, Chicago Arts Archive, http://sixtyinchesfromcenter.org/archive/?p=17269 (Accessed September 4, 2012).

  4. Lupe Fiasco, “Lupe Fiasco: This City Is a Robot,” Chicago Sun-Times, www.suntimes.com/lifestyles/splash/12870919-418/lupe-fiasco-this-city-is-a-robot.html (Accessed June 5, 2012).

  5. “The Mysterious Phenomenon That Transforms Average Songwriters Into Legends,” Songwriting Secrets, www.songwriting-secrets.net/songwriting-inspiration.html (Accessed June 1, 2012).

  Chapter 9: A Clock for Time Travelers

  1. Fred Alan Wolf, Fred Alan Wolf, www.fredalanwolf.com (Accessed April 10, 2012).

  2. Duffy Damien and John Jennings, Black Comix (New York: Mark Batty Publishing, 2010), 164.

  3. Wolf, www.fredalanwolf.com (Accessed April 10, 2012).

  4. Jo Walton, “Time Travel and Slavery,” Tor, www.tor.com/blogs/2009/04/octavia-butlers-kindred (Accessed June 1, 2012).

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Ytasha L. Womack is a filmmaker, futurist, and the author of Post Black: How a New Generation Is Redefining African American Identity and 2212: Book of Rayla. She is the creator of the Rayla 2212 sci-fi multimedia series, the director of the award-winning film The Engagement, the producer and writer of Love Shorts, and the coeditor of Beats Rhymes and Life: What We Love and Hate About Hip Hop. She has written for many publications including Ebony and the Chicago Tribune and has appeared on E! True Hollywood Stories: Rappers Wives.

 

 

 
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