Hope you’re having a pleasant holiday. I feel sorry for many East Coast folks who are wet due to Tropical Depression Bonnie today. We’ve got clear skies, a light breeze out of the northwest and 80F degrees here, which seems odd for Memorial Day in the Great Lakes State.
The pleasantness heightens the contrast of this embedded short film, Robots of Brixton by Kibwe Tavares and FactoryFifteen. It’s a nice example of Afrofuturism, this one blending science fiction, fantasy, and historical nonfiction from perspective of the African diaspora. We are treating technology as we do humans of color — as disposable inconveniences, seeing their frustration as nuisance rather than a angry plea for deeper consideration.
I’ll let you imagine the things I typed and deleted here about the future. That is the entire exercise of futurism — imagining what could be, will be, should be — and it’s not limited to nor should it be defined by the dominant culture. What do you imagine?
And what did they imagine, the ones we memorialize today? Did the future fail, meet, or exceed their expectations?