Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism
Toward Afrocentric Futurism
A vanguard challenge to unite two formerly independent fields in Black studies
Description
Contributions by Taharka Adé, Molefi Kete Asante, Alonge O. Clarkson, John P. Craig, Ifetayo M. Flannery, Kofi Kubatanna, Lehasa Moloi, M. Ndiika Mutere, and Aaron X. Smith
In the twenty-first century, AfroFuturism—a historical and philosophical concept of the future imagined through a Black cultural lens—has been interpreted through a myriad of writers, artists, scientists, and other visionary creatives. In Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism: Toward Afrocentric Futurism, editor Aaron X. Smith curates a collection of interdisciplinary essays that critiques existing scholarship on Black futurity. In contrast to much previous work, these essays ground their explorations in African agency, centering the African within historical and cultural reality. Situating Afrocentricity as the field’s foundational root and springboard for an expansive future, contributors detail potential new modes of existence and expression for African people throughout the diaspora.
Divided into two parts—Representations and Transformations—this book examines the tensions created by historical and cultural dislocation of African peoples and consciousness. Contributors cover varied topics such as the intersections of culture and design; techno culture; neuroscience; and the multiplicity of African cultural influences in aesthetics, oratory, visual art, hip hop, and more. Essays range from theoretical analyses to close readings of history and popular culture, from the Haitian Revolution to Sun Ra, Janelle Monáe’s Dirty Computer, and Black Panther. Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism offers an expansive vision of AfroFuturism and its ranging significance to contemporary culture and discourse.
Reviews
"Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism is a necessary publication for an emerging field. Smith's editorial skills merge two paradigms and establish a variety of tools to analyze this new historical method. Together, with a primer or two on AfroFuturism, this series of essays provides a backbone to the scholarship of Afrocentric Futurism."
- Jonathan S. Lower, Journal of Popular Culture
"Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism is a welcome collection examining the creativity of artists of African descent working in different genres."
- B. Agozino, CHOICE
"The audience is presented with the impacts and implications of Afrocentric agency from different angles, from the Haitian Revolution to film. Each chapter speaks to the purpose of the volume but in its own unique way, which the audience can appreciate greatly."
- Giselle C. M. Greenidge, The Journal of African American History
"The contributors to this collection challenge and thereby expand the theoretical concepts taken up in their essays. Afrocentricity in AfroFuturism is cutting-edge Afrofuturist scholarship."
- Alexis Brooks de Vita, professor of English at Texas Southern University
"Readers will not walk away from this book without knowing the future has a sun that enlightens, enlivens, and inspires all of the humans walking the Earth. Through Afrocentricity in Afrofuturism, there will be more than a dark star, black sun, or colored moon to imagine, but rather a future of healing, restoration, and thriving for African Americans alongside other races of the United States will manifest into reality before the reader’s very eyes, through their reformed mind and by their own two hands."
- Jenesis Bronner, Film Matters Magazine