by Ahmed Best | Afrofuturist Podcast | Twitter: @ahmedbest The Afrofuturist Podcast brings forward the people and ideas that strive to shape the future from places seldom discussed but equally valuable. From artists and engineers to technologists and thought leaders, this podcast showcases those that are passionate about diversifying and democratizing the building of the future. Co-created by Ahmed Best and Lonny Brooks. Hosted by Ahmed Best. Introducing The Afrofuturist Podcast with Dr. Lonny Brooks The inaugural episode of The Afrofuturist Podcast featuring the show’s resident afrofuturist Dr. Lonny Brooks. Brooks is a professor of communication at Cal State University…
Author: Abril Chimal
Art by: Stacey Robinson Concept Art of Wakanda from Marvel Cinematic Universe* As Kodwo Eshun phrased it in his article “Further Considerations on Afrofuturism” (2003), we need to deepen our Afrofutures toolkit. An Afrofutures toolkit is a manner of thinking “developed for and by Afrodiasporic intellectuals” with the imperative “to code, adopt, adapt, translate, misread, rework, and revise” visions of Black aspiration and imagination. As the historic Black Panther film set box office records, it simultaneously embodied and problematized our current Black Diasporic and Pan African imagination. With its presentation of Wakanda, the mythical and technologically advanced Black nation untouched…
by Sebastian Bollien On the 9th of August 2020, the presidential elections of Belarus ended officially with a landslide victory of Alexander Lukashenko, the head of state since 1994. Despite the fact, that no presidential election of this century considered to be free and fair by international observers (Shotter & Seddon, 2020), the reaction of the civil society has never been as severe and far-reaching. It resulted in month-long mass protests throughout the country and governmental answers with increasing numbers of arrests, convictions, terror, and violence. The evident rigging of the election, repression against opposition or journalists and the severe…
郑科骥(Louis ZHENG), 未来学家俱乐部（中国） 王家琨(JK WANG), 未来学家俱乐部（中国） 概述 本文旨在介绍一种笔者在社群活动实践中经常采取的以策展+工作坊形式的研究方法，结合未来学、个体视角、青年叙事。通过共创工作坊中个人创作的拼贴画，了解个体未来叙事，并尝试延展到对青年群体未来的长期追踪和分析。本文详细分享了这套方法的基本框架、研究及活动流程，并用具体案例解释图景分析方法。 关键词：未来图景、叙事拼贴画、共创式展览 Summary This article aims to introduce a research method that the author often adopts in the practice of community activities in the form of exhibition curation + workshop, combining foresight, individual perspective, and youth storytelling Through the collages created by workshop participants, we can understand the future narrative of individuals, and try to extend it to the long-term tracking and analysis of the future of youth groups. This article shares the basic framework, research, and process of this method in detail, and uses specific cases to explain the collage analysis method.…
by Helen Halford The extraordinary social and economic impacts of COVID-19 have profoundly disrupted the operations of social purpose organisations and shifted the needs and perspectives of the communities they serve. At the same time, the importance of maximising the impacts of activities that create meaningful and long-term social transformation that is relevant to present and future generations has never been greater. This presents a complex and critical problem at the level of both business and beneficiaries. Causal Layered Analysis (CLA) is a method for deepening the process of addressing complex social problems and formulating alternative futures. Questioning and creating…
by Marguerite Coetzee In Hindu mythology, it is believed that the Earth is balanced on the backs of elephants, which are themselves supported by a World Turtle. Below that turtle? Another turtle. It is turtles all the way down. In complexity and systems thinking, it could be argued that a proposition requires justification, and the justification itself needs to be supported. No idea exists in isolation, no truth in a vacuum, no experience untethered from others. It is turtles all the way down. By identifying layers of analysis, Causal Layered Analysis is a sense-making tool that explores the narratives used…
by Christian Gruenwald Relief in large parts of the world’s politics was great when the news of Joe Biden’s election victory spread. After days of restraint, many heads of government could not go fast enough with the congratulations after the television stations announced Biden’s victory. The presidency of Donald Trump seems to be history for now. But Trumpism is still there. In this context, Trumpism is not so much an ideology as a style of understanding and conducting politics. It includes scorn for rule-based multilateralism and political correctness. The systematic shifting of limits of what can be said and limitations…
Sohail Inayatullah[1], Arun Jacob[2] and Reham Rizk[3] What are the futures of manufacturing in Egypt in the next five to ten years? Can Egypt use the COVID-19 crisis to quickly retool and create a revolution in manufacturing unlocking business? Or will the gap between the rich and poor, the prepared and unprepared, continue to widen? Indeed, how should Egypt position itself in terms of not just the pandemic (near-shoring, localization), but other disruptions such as changes in technology (robotics and automation, the Internet of everything, digitalized government, 3D printing); greening and sustainability (the shift to a circular economy, eco-friendly products);…
by Otto C. Frommelt The Coronavirus disease brought about a pandemic that has changed our lives and the way we conduct business beyond recognition. Right now, we are just at the beginning of a long journey into the future in a post-pandemic world. The objective of this article is to present an outlook of possible futures with regards to the impact on society, government and our business community. It includes practical and possible new business models focusing on a circular economy business environment. In the following, I will outline key drivers and sketch plausible scenarios. Post-pandemic scenarios Considering two key…
by Jose Ramos How do we make sense of the dramatic changes happening during the coronavirus pandemic? How do we get on an empowered footing rather than reaction and confusion? So many have simply been struck by “future shock”, i.e. the future has arrived but it has arrived in a daunting pathological guise. People are not prepared, indeed many are just dumbfounded as taken for granted aspects of life are thrown asunder. Many search for meaning amid the intellectual centrifuge which is social media today, lost in the bramble of conspiracy theories, xenophobic blame and a 24 hour news cycle.…