So great to see Miranda Iossifidis‘s article on this out. It explores the speculative climate futures fabricated by population-focused environmental charities and non-profit organizations – how they draw on NGO Science Fiction (SF) capital and eco-emotions to promote neo-Malthusian ideas and interventions.
Open access: https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2025.2601613
Really enjoying starting my new academic year as part of this workshop at LIAS in Lüneburg today – fascinating papers rigorously interrogating utopia, desire, materialism and imagination in contexts of climate crisis and neo-liberalism. Thanks to Egidijus Mardosas and Jason Goldfarb for organising (and to Egidijus for sharing the quotes from Abensour below).
Lisa Garforth
NUCUSP member, Dr Lisa Garforth will be speaking at an event in King’s College London in February on ‘New Directions in Utopian Studies’. Lisa’s paper is entitled, ‘Utopia as a social thing: on dreaming, doing, defining and describing’
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/new-directions-in-utopian-studies-tickets-1979739755903
This event is part of the AHRC network on Utopia and Failure.
Thanks to everyone who came along and contributed to a fantastic conversation about utopian, speculative and prefigurative thinking and methods on Mon 8th December.
We were lucky to have talks from Tom Schofield on AI future imaginaries; Ruth Houghton on utopia and constitutionalism; Oscar Horton Chandler on grief and hope in the Jeremy Corbyn wave.
Oscar and Ruth in action:
Thanks to the Law School for their support. We also had a couple of inventive round table discussions about our shared theoretical resources, methodologies and analytical approaches that we’ll be sharing here soon.
Reading Science/Fiction by cluster members Miranda Iossifidis and Lisa Garforth, along with Amy C. Chambers and Joanna Verran. We explore how readers use speculative fiction to make personal, political and civic sense of living in densely techno-scientific societies.
Ruth Houghton appears alongside Aoife O’Donoghue and Matt Leggatt in an episode of Utopian and Dystopian Fictions.
Oscar Horton Chandler acted as a Rapporteur for the AHRC Utopia and Failure Network workshop in Newcastle in September 2024.
In a blog post on the AHRC Utopia and Failure network blog, Oscar provided some reflections. You can read the blog post: Reflections on our second workshop in Newcastle by Oscar Horton Chandler (I) | School of Social and Political Science
On 11th June 2025, Rebecca Coleman led a creative methods workshop. Rebecca is Professor in the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies at Bristol University. She led academics and researchers in a creative exercise of building utopias as part of a teach-out at Newcastle University. Against the backdrop of a Higher Education sector that is in crisis, with UCU strikes at Newcastle, people gathered in the local pub to create a space where it might be possible to engage in alternative utopian worldbuilding.
You can read about the workshop on the AHRC Utopia and Failure network blog: Practical utopias: A creative methods workshop | School of Social and Political Science
Miranda Iossifidis writes with Mack Sproates and Bethan for AHRC Network Utopia and Failure about ‘Exploring speculative climate justice futures with creative methods’
Read the blog post discussing their Zine-making workshops: Exploring speculative climate justice futures with creative methods | School of Social and Political Science
This zine is made by the Speculative Climate Futures zine workshop folks, including Ansh Meeta, Francesca DiGiorgio, Jim Kaufman, Shevek Fodor & Sophie Buxton. The beautiful cover, paintings and zine layout are by Mack.
Welcome to Blogging Service. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start writing!