Afrofuturism knows that futures are made – and that who gets to make them is a political question
The digital age sings a seductive song of progress, yet a deliberate erasure echoes within its circuits. We stand at a crossroads, where technology, particularly the promise of artificial intelligence, threatens both to illuminate and to obliterate.
Whose perspectives will shape, and whose will be erased from, the future we build? AI, in particular, has become the latest battleground in a culture war that oscillates between unchecked techno-optimism and dystopian fear. We are told, on one hand, that AI will save us – from disease, inefficiency, ignorance – on the other, that it will replace us, dominate us, erase us.
Lonny Avi Brooks is Professor and Chair of Communication at Cal State East Bay, co-founder of the AfroRithm Futures Group, and co-creator of AfroRithms From The Future, a visionary storytelling game that imagines liberated futures through Black, Indigenous, and Queer perspectives
Reynaldo Anderson is Associate Professor of Africology and African American Studies Temple University
Acknowledgements: we wish to acknowledge Ben Hamamoto and Sheree Renée Thomas for their review of this article and their thoughtful suggestions and edits.
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