Exploring literary visions of greener, fairer ways of being
This week I saw that the Science Fiction collection at the University of Liverpool has been awarded ‘Designated Status’ by Arts Council England. I’m very happy for them because visiting the archive was one of the highlights of my trip to Liverpool for the Current Research in Speculative Fiction conference earlier this year.
Continue reading “Big Love for the University of Liverpool’s Science Fiction Collection”The CRSF annual conference took place on 3-4 July 2025. It was a hybrid event and I joined remotely. The official theme of the conference was ‘boundaries’. However, I felt there were two other themes that emerged from the event. Firstly the global prevalence of SF, which the hybrid format supported as it allowed for attendees from around the world. Secondly, fungal fiction, a current favourite topic of mine.
Continue reading “Current Research in Speculative Fiction (CRSF) 2025 conference report”
What’s the crossover between land work and utopia? I feel there is one, although it’s hard to articulate. Isn’t utopia science fiction, set in not-real places with fictional technology? How can that relate to working the land?
Well, increasingly utopian fiction is earthbound, with characters whose physical connection with the earth go beyond our own. Think the orogenes in N. K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy who manipulate seismic energy, and Vern in Rivers Solomon’s Sorrowland whose fungal “passenger” enables her to communicate through mycelial networks.
Then there is movement the other way, too. I recently visited the We Feed The UK exhibition across the Royal Photographic Society and Martin Parr Foundation galleries at Paintworks in Bristol. This project brought photographers and poets to farms across the UK who are growing agroecologically, eschewing intensive farming methods. Viewing the exhibition, it was clear to me the photographers and poets had seen hope in these places and were conveying this through their work.
What follows is my review of the exhibition, with a focus on the latent utopianism within its celebration of the “custodians of soil and sea”.
Continue reading ““The constellations were at our feet this whole time”: We Feed The UK’s earthy utopias”
Last week, in the council chamber within the main building of Cardiff University surrounded by portraits of venerable white men, I attended a day long workshop on decolonial research led by Dr Leon Moosavi. As I embark on my PhD I am interested in what it takes to do the day job in a way that embodies the decolonial ideals of the utopian fictions I am studying, so that my research can work towards the same aim.
Continue reading “Decolonial researcher training – some thoughts”A word at the outset of this report to note there will be spoilers for the Broken Earth trilogy by N. K. Jemisin. Also, this report is not comprehensive. Conversely, it is highly subjective and reflects what I personally found exciting and pertinent to my own areas of interest. This means mostly Jemisin, Nisi Shawl and Rivers Solomon, utopia, visionary fiction and decolonisation. As you’re reading the Just Utopias blog you’re hopefully here for this, so let’s crack on.
Continue reading “Women in the Black Fantastic conference report”
St David’s in Wales, the smallest city in Britain, has a population of less than 2,000 but a massive cathedral. This disparity is due to it having been an important site of pilgrimage for over 1,000 years. In 1123, the Pope even declared that two trips to St David’s were as good as one to Rome. This October, I was one of a number who descended on St David’s, not for a religious pilgrimage but for a gathering of poets.
Continue reading “Pilgrims: A gathering of poets in West Wales”Carolyn Dougherty reflects on this event, which promised:
Continue reading “How to fight the barriers of capitalism with poetry”expressive spoken word on fighting the barriers of capitalism, interactive visuals co-created by our robot friends, ambient electronic beats with soft rainforest settings, and the voices of those ready to design a world that can be peacefully navigated by all.”
Jack Halberstam’s keynote ‘Unworlding: An Aesthetics of Collapse’ really was the absolute highlight of the Utopian Studies Society of Europe conference. But wait! You didn’t have to be there! A version of the lecture is available on YouTube so I wanted to share the details. It contains some real IDEAS about UTOPIA and I highly recommend checking it out.
Continue reading “Jack Halberstam’s Unworlding: An Aesthetics of Collapse”
The thing that took me farthest out of my comfort zone in 2022 was attending the Utopian Studies Society conference. I thought it would be nice to have a few days away to discuss all things utopian but I was wrong. I stretched my elastic too far just to get there. It was my first time travelling on my own and travelling much at all since the pandemic and having a child (both things that have tied me to home over the past few years). Having to then leave my room and attend events was so hard. This is despite my room (in student halls) being unbearably hot and depressing.
Yes, this was another USS conference in a heatwave, like the previous one in Prato, Italy in 2019 where we discussed utopia, dystopia and climate change in 40 degree heat (Celcius, folks). Just the thing to make discussions feel urgent and hopeless at the same time.
Continue reading “Review of Twoty-Twoty-Two (2022): Utopian Studies Conference”
Sometimes you don’t know how you feel about something until the morning after. Yesterday I visited a prototype Martian house, learnt about growing plants hydroponically and participated in a ‘plant-bathing’ meditation and tea ceremony. We picked lemon balm leaves from the indoor garden to make our tea.
Over tea, we talked about how extraordinary growing plants would be for the wellbeing of anyone living on Mars.
Continue reading “From lemon balm tea in a Martian house to lemon verbena in the woods”