Speculative Whiteness
Science Fiction and the Alt-Right
Checking Availibility...Description
Reveals the alt-right's project to claim science fiction and--by extension--the future
Fascists such as Richard Spencer interpret science fiction films and literature as saying only white men have the imagination required to invent a high-tech future. Other white nationalists envision racist utopias filled with Aryan supermen and all-white space colonies. Speculative Whiteness traces these ideas through the entangled histories of science fiction culture and white supremacist politics, showing that debates about representation in science fiction films and literature are struggles over who has the right to imagine and inhabit the future. Although fascists insist that tomorrow belongs to them, they have always been and will continue to be contested by antifascist fans willing to fight for the future.
About this Author
Jordan S. Carroll is author of Reading the Obscene: Transgressive Editors and the Class Politics of US Literature, which won the MLA Prize for Independent Scholars.
Reviews
"Carroll reminds us that our future is contingent. Fascists have a vision for the future that excludes most of humanity, but fascists can be defeated. The future is for everyone--if we make it that way." --Los Angeles Review of Books
"A small book with a mighty punch." --Choice Magazine
"The book is an important chronicle documenting the past decade or so of right wing extremism at the level of aesthetics and political ontology, and there is nothing else quite like it."--De Facto Podcast
"[For] those who consider the world of culture as less meaningful and important than realpolitik, drawing connections between science fiction and the far right may seem frivolous at best. Carroll's engaging and concise book, however, convincingly dispels such misgivings by showing how science fiction offers a unique window into the inner workings of key far-right thinkers, both past and present."--Ethnic and Racial Studies
"What makes Speculative Whiteness. . .by Jordan S. Carroll such a compelling study is its demonstration that the connection between the alt-right--arguably the dominant political force in the US and perhaps globally--and certain strands of science fiction is far from superficial." --Critical Inquiry
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