“All we have is means”: Ursula K. Le Guin’s utopianism as ongoingness
“All we have is means”: Ursula K. Le Guin’s utopianism as ongoingness
Author(s): Alexis ShotwellSubject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Studies of Literature, Political Philosophy, Politics and society, American Literature, Sociology of Literature
Published by: SAV - Slovenská akadémia vied - Ústav svetovej literatúry
Keywords: Utopianism; Abolitionism; Anarchism; Ongoingness; Social movements
Summary/Abstract: This article argues that we can affirm the impulse to change our current course and start over, while rejecting the idea that new beginnings take us out of our social and historical embeddedness. Instead, I propose using Ursula K. Le Guin’s science fiction and anarchist attention to process and “ongoingness” as a political good. Bringing her novels The Lathe of Heaven (1971) and The Dispossessed (1974) into conversation with contemporary movements for prison abolition, this essay ask show her imperfect utopianism contributes to understandings of political prefiguration, process, and the idea that social transformation must be an ongoing project.
Journal: World Literature Studies
- Issue Year: 16/2024
- Issue No: 4
- Page Range: 3-17
- Page Count: 15
- Language: English