Towards a Local Preferred Future
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
– Abraham Lincoln –
Dystopia is an undesirable and unfair society with a lot of suffering. Utopia is an imaginary society that is perfect and ideal and thus unattainable. Between the two extremes, there can exist a good, preferred future society that is realistic and achievable. In this exercise you are asked to imagine a future society that would be good, preferred and attainable, the kind of future you would like to live in.
Exercise A includes a Quizlet set that challenges you to imagine different elements of society from three different perspectives, those of a dystopian, utopian and preferred future. Exercise B takes you into the local level, into the location you are currently living in, and again asks you to imagine it from the three perspectives and then to consider actions to make the preferred future come true. What can we do to progress towards it? How should we change our thinking, beliefs and behavior? How should structures change? Exercises A and B are optional but complementary.
Exercise A: Imagining dystopian, utopian and preferred futures
Flip the cards in this Quizlet set on ‘Dystopia, Utopia and Preferred Future’ and discuss the questions from the perspectives of dystopian, utopian and preferred future. You may find the following glossaries useful at accomplishing the exercise:
A Complete Glossary of Terms for Science Fiction Writers by Writers Write
Future’s Frequency Dictionary by Sitra
In addition to discussion, you could create a poster or brochure advertising your society trying to convince people to move in, a book description of your sci-fi novel or maybe a piece of dialogue in it, a trailer of a sci-fi film you have directed, rap or song lyrics describing your future society, for instance. Or maybe you can come up with some less conventional and more innovative format for your project that has not even been invented yet!
Exercise B: Taking action towards a local preferred future
1. Take a picture of three locations in your vicinity that are important to you and your community. Explain why they are important and what they mean to the community.
2. Imagine these three locations from the dystopian and utopian perspective (in 2050): What are they like? Which factors have caused this situation? What does the location now mean to the individual and to the community?
3. What actions could be taken to prevent the dystopian vision from coming true? What could be done to make the utopian vision come true to some extent? What actions to influence the future can we take in the present relating to a) the everyday activities of the members of your community, b) the structures of the community and society (eg. education, services, technology, media) and c) ways of thinking (values, gender roles, environmental issues).
“The future depends on what we do in the present.”
– Mahatma Gandhi –