Science fiction against the state

Undergraduate / Graduate

This course reads science fiction and other texts (including theory, essays and zines) that imagine what it might mean to live against, beyond or without the state, and thus beyond or against the law, the police and capitalism. We will engage with these other worlds in an attempt to formulate our own visions of other possible forms of communal life and relation. We will pay particular attention to questions of liberatory struggle; borders, policing and imprisonment; race, gender, family and social reproduction; and environment and ecological relations. We'll also spend some time thinking about actually existing forms of living against the state (including encampments, blockades, autonomous zones). SF authors may include Ursula Le Guin, Samuel Delany, Tade Thompson, Octavia Butler, and ME O'Brien and Eman Abdelhadi. Other authors may include Saidiya Hartman, Fredy Perlman, James Scott, Orisanmi Burton, Joy James and David Graeber.