Eight Works of Visionary Fiction That Help Us Imagine — and Realize — Better Futures
From ‘Parable of the Sower’ to ‘Sorry to Bother You,’ these works of visionary fiction will help you conceptualize and create a more just world
This piece is part of a series on visionary fiction we’re running on OneZero to examine how future culture can affect change now. In her companion feature about the growing genre, Walidah Imarisha, author, educator, and co-editor of Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, explains how stories about the future are imperative to helping us build a better one. (Stories like Octavia Butler’s Bloodchild, which we also published in full.) Here, Imarisha gives us a reading and viewing list of works of visionary fiction that will help us get our minds into gear.
Visionary fiction is fantastical art that helps us understand and challenge existing power structures — and supports us in imagining paths to dreaming and resting more just worlds and futures. It is intricately connected to community organizing and liberation movements. It centers the narratives, vision, and leadership of those who are marginalized and oppressed, especially those at the intersections of identities. Visionary fiction helps us imagine different…
