Episode 248: African Sci-Fi Looks to a Future Climate

Lost Ark Dreaming cover art by Raphael LaCoste

When the writer Nnedi Okorafor coined the term Africanfuturism, she wanted to distinguish sci-fi written about Africa from Afrofuturism, which is focuses on the experiences of Black people in the diaspora. Africanfuturism mixes the traditional with the futuristic in a way that resembles modern life in Africa, and many of these stories grapple with climate change. Although the writer Chinelo Onwualu says cli-fi isn’t a subgenre for African writers. It’s often baked into a lot of Africanfuturism because the continent is already at the forefront of climate emergencies. And the writers Suyi Davies Okungbowa and Wole Talabi explain that Africanfuturist cli-fi isn’t as dystopian as Western cli-fi. These visions of the future may feel daunting but there is often a sense of hope and the solutions are more community focused. The actress Nneka Okoye reads from their stories, and other works by African writers. 

African Sci-Fi Looks to a Future Climate transcript

MUSIC LIST

• Fortress Europe by Dan Bodan

• Ancient Awakening by Bjorn Alva  

• Lulu Is the Cat I Like Best by pATCHES

• Night Music by Kevin Macleod

• Gra Landsby by Blue Dot Sessions

• So Hideous a Chain by Sono Sanctus

• Capilla by Blue Dot Sessions

• Aporia by Phantom Fauna

• Awake Through The Night by Sono Sanctus

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Reading list from this episode: 

• Works of Nnedi Okorafor

• Wole Talabi’s anthology Convergence Problems

• Suyi Davies Okungbowa’s novella Lost Ark Dreaming

• Chinelo Onwualu’s short story Letters to My Mother

• Omenana Magazine

• Dilman Dila’s story The Leafy Man from the book A Killing in the Sun

• Mame Bougouma’s story Lekki Lekki from Africanfuturism: An Anthology