Getting started with the Applied African Speculative Fiction toolkit
Are you new to speculative fiction? Not sure how it can be useful for you? On this page you will learn about what speculative fiction is, why the focus on African speculative fiction is so important and how it can be used.
Speculative fiction as a design tool
What is speculative fiction?
Speculative fiction is used as a general term to include science fiction, fantasy and other genres which use allegory to explore important themes. It is a way of asking ourselves “What if?” and thinking about how things like technology or customs can impact society in different ways.
From that perspective, speculative fiction is a bit like a laboratory experiment – only we use storytelling to test our ideas! They can even help you think about specific communities and groups within communities who often get left out in discussions on a particular theme.
Further reading on speculative fiction as a design tool
-
Afrofutures and Aquatic Worlds in Contemporary Art
“In modernity the oceans are places of globalisation, capitalism, and climate change. Through Afrofuturist visions the seas offer aesthetic languages for aquatic transformation and fictional marine species. ”
Why the focus on African speculative fiction?
It’s often said that ‘African is the future’, but the reality is that Africa has always been the future. It was enslaved African and indigenous labour which provided the foundations of modern capitalism – to this day, Africa’s resources (often owned by international companies) are what enable us to make use of technologies like smartphones and GPS; African workers are training AI and moderating content to make the internet a workable experience for the majority of users.
In spite of this, Africa and African needs are rarely considered when thinking about the future. The Applied African Speculative Fiction toolkit is based on the philosophy that focussing on the often ignored and disenfranchised can help design better solutions overall. By looking at technology from an African perspective first, we can better see the unintended outcomes, the dangers and pitfalls, unexpected opportunities and above all, a more holistic way of creating our tomorrow.
It’s pretty common to hear ‘Africa is the future’.
Florence Okoye, A matter of perspective: confronting the racialised imaginary to create STEM policy
The immediate reply to this statement is “for whom?”. Even today, the majority of structures overseeing the flow of resources are not controlled by African states. The cost of neo-colonial extraction is evidenced by the horrendous situations in Congo and Sudan; despite the fact that 70% of the population is under 30, Nigeria (the self-proclaimed “Heartbeat of Africa”) slaughters the youth it will depend on for its own future as they protest against police brutality.
When we see the kind of exploitative deals made by African leaders, the continual construction of Fortress Europe in a context of climate shifts and the growth of a technology hungry Asian middle class, it’s not unreasonable to ask what other futurities the Africa of 2050 will encounter.
How can speculative fiction be used?
There are lots of ways that speculative fiction can be used. Reading a short story together could be a way of expanding the imagination and helping people think about questions in a new way. Sometimes it can be used to inspire new technologies and ways of working. It can even help you think about specific communities and groups within communities who often get left out in discussions on a particular theme.
Whether you use it speculative fiction to create a list of requirements for a technology, or as a different way of thinking about a question, we think it can be used at any stage of a design process and to design anything, from a new technology or service, to a policy document or community campaign.
Reading guides and workshop outlines
Whether you’re hosting a reading group or co-designing a policy intervention, these are guides designed to help you make the most of the various short stories, essays and other speculative content.
Each toolkit will have some recommended stories, or a guide to finding the stories that best suit your needs.
-
Practical applications of speculative fiction: an introduction
This session aims to introduce people to practically using speculative fiction. Whether used for improving research questions, inspiring activism/advocacy or serving as a teaching tool, there are many aspects of STEM where speculative fiction can be applied. However, it is still often needed to give people more familiarity with both the fiction and how it…
-
Critiquing policy documents using African Speculative Fiction
This method is designed to help communities of people critique and update STEM policy. It is useful for a group of mixed abilities and experiences i.e. not only for people with professional policy-making experience Time required: recommended minimum time of 2 hours