Reparative Worldbuilding: Black and Indigenous Collaboration in New Media & Speculative Non/fiction
April 23, 4pm EST
Closely associated with sci-fi and fantasy stories, ‘worldbuilding’ often refers to the fictional construction of whole ecological and planetary systems. In any saga—beyond the plot, characters, or a given setting—worldbuilding involves the non-linear creation and composition of new logics and beings. New and magical entities appear, birthed by imagination. But the process likewise pulls inspiration from and responds to our current world; fictive worlds are built as a criticism, reaction, or extension of lived experience and perceived possibilities.
In this online talk, new media artist collaborators and peers Samay Arcentales Cajas and Kim Ninkuru discuss the reparative potential in collaborative Black and Indigenous worldbuilding—and how we might realize or learn from dream worlds through techno-cultural imagination, redefinition, and transformation