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\n \n 2026\n \n \n (3)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Science Fiction Ecologies: Worldmaking with Butler, Le Guin, and Merril.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Streeby, S.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n of Postmillennial pop seriesNYU Press, New York, 2026.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@book{streeby_science_2026,\n\taddress = {New York},\n\tseries = {Postmillennial pop series},\n\ttitle = {Science {Fiction} {Ecologies}: {Worldmaking} with {Butler}, {Le} {Guin}, and {Merril}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-4798-3344-3},\n\tshorttitle = {Science {Fiction} {Ecologies}},\n\tabstract = {Explores how feminist science-fiction writers engage with ecological and environmental speculation and memory-work.\nScience Fiction Ecologies traces how Octavia E. Butler, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Judith Merril—three generations of groundbreaking feminist science fiction writers—used ecological imagination and rigorous memory-work to rethink environments, histories, and possible futures. Shelley Streeby mines their expansive personal archives of letters, journals, notebooks, annotated clippings, and other everyday materials to show how each writer documented environmental news, social movements, colonial and imperial legacies, and the accelerating militarism of the late twentieth century. This archival labor, Streeby argues, was not ancillary but central to their worldmaking: a form of “histofuturist” practice that linked creative speculation to the preservation and reimagining of knowledge. Against a backdrop of shrinking public library budgets, intensifying weapons development, and the rise of privatization politics, Butler, Le Guin, and Merril fought for the survival of libraries and the democratic circulation of ideas. Their activism, along with their contributions to popular science-fiction culture and their public interventions, reveals how they imagined libraries, archives, and other knowledge spaces as living ecologies shaped by power, identity, and access. Through speculative documentary methods,\nScience Fiction Ecologies illuminates the counter-histories embedded in their papers, tracing how their visions challenged ecologies dominated by state power, white Christian nationalism, violent masculinities, and entrenched class and race inequalities. Streeby ultimately shows how these writers’ intertwined lives and works open new ways of thinking about environments, human survival, and the futures we might yet build.},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tpublisher = {NYU Press},\n\tauthor = {Streeby, Shelley},\n\tcollaborator = {Streeby, Shelley},\n\tyear = {2026},\n\tkeywords = {Criticism and interpretation, History and criticism, Sustainability, Women},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n “Altadena Is Not for Sale”: Black Geographies, Wildfire Afterlives, and Speculative Justice in the Wake.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Binoy, P.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 0(0): 1–17. April 2026.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"“Altadena$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{binoy_altadena_2026,\n\ttitle = {“{Altadena} {Is} {Not} for {Sale}”: {Black} {Geographies}, {Wildfire} {Afterlives}, and {Speculative} {Justice} in the {Wake}},\n\tvolume = {0},\n\tissn = {2469-4452},\n\tshorttitle = {“{Altadena} {Is} {Not} for {Sale}”},\n\turl = {https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2026.2644382},\n\tdoi = {10.1080/24694452.2026.2644382},\n\tabstract = {This article examines the aftermath of the 2025 Eaton Fire in Altadena, California, a historically Black, unincorporated community facing wildfire destruction, displacement pressures, and speculative redevelopment. Drawing on analysis of news reportage, visual culture, Octavia Butler’s speculative fiction, and local community organizing, I argue that wildfire in Altadena cannot be understood as a singular environmental event but as part of a longer racial-spatial process shaped by structural abandonment, racial capitalism, and uneven vulnerability. At the same time, the article shows how residents mobilize memory, art, refusal, and collective care to resist disaster-driven dispossession and imagine alternative futures of recovery. Focusing on Sunny Mills’s tintype photography and local postfire organizing, I demonstrate how speculative and creative practices function as geographic knowledge, enabling communities to narrate loss while asserting claims to land, belonging, and return. This article argues that the work of writer Octavia Butler, who hails from Altadena, is not just fiction, but a theory of speculative justice and futures. The article contributes to Black geographies and environmental justice scholarship by theorizing speculative world-building as a method for understanding disaster afterlives and for envisioning just recovery beyond technocratic resilience frameworks.},\n\tnumber = {0},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tjournal = {Annals of the American Association of Geographers},\n\tpublisher = {Taylor \\& Francis},\n\tauthor = {Binoy, Parvathy},\n\tmonth = apr,\n\tyear = {2026},\n\tkeywords = {Black ecological thought, Black geographies, wildfire afterlives},\n\tpages = {1--17},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n “A tool for reconstruction”: The interplay of identity, memory, and ecology in Octavia E Butler’s Dawn.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Dixit, M.; and Ravichandran, T.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Memory Studies,17506980261447365. May 2026.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"“A$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{dixit_tool_2026,\n\ttitle = {“{A} tool for reconstruction”: {The} interplay of identity, memory, and ecology in {Octavia} {E} {Butler}’s {Dawn}},\n\tissn = {1750-6980},\n\tshorttitle = {“{A} tool for reconstruction”},\n\turl = {https://doi.org/10.1177/17506980261447365},\n\tdoi = {10.1177/17506980261447365},\n\tabstract = {This article explores the interplay of memory, identity, and ecology in Octavia E Butler’s Dawn, arguing that the novel radically reconceptualizes the ecology of memory through posthuman and interspecies entanglements. Set in a post-apocalyptic world, Dawn does not simply thematize but reorganizes memory as an embodied, collective, and environmentally embedded system whose conditions of access and mediation reconfigure identity and survival after catastrophe. Through Lilith’s encounter with the alien Oankali, their bio-digital networks, and mediated eco-sexual desire and reproduction, the novel interrogates how memory and identity are reshaped by environmental collapse, ontological displacement, and interspecies hybridity. The article contends that Dawn relocates memory from an interior, anthropocentric capacity to a distributed infrastructure in an altered ecology. By examining the intersections of ecological transformation and identity, the article interrogates the limits of remembrance and the politics of forgetting. It examines how Butler’s speculative world reorganizes memory in ways that unsettle human-centered models of autonomy, sustainability, and survival, foregrounding hybridity, intercorporeality, and futurity as integral to memory’s very structure. Reflecting on the established readings of Dawn concerned with coercion, race, biopolitics, and posthuman remaking, this article advances a memory-studies intervention: Butler’s speculative ecology makes legible how futural, mediated memory is produced, managed, and redistributed within hybrid assemblages of organism, environment, and technics. It reframes sustainability and futurity in Dawn as mnemonic problems: not recovery of a lost human past, but the contested reconstruction of personhood, kinship, and ecological belonging within posthuman assemblages.},\n\tlanguage = {EN},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tjournal = {Memory Studies},\n\tpublisher = {SAGE Publications},\n\tauthor = {Dixit, Mani and Ravichandran, Thangamani},\n\tmonth = may,\n\tyear = {2026},\n\tpages = {17506980261447365},\n}\n

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\n \n 2025\n \n \n (3)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Shaper of God.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Artist, A.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Pioneer Works Press, Brooklyn, NY, 2025.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@book{artist_shaper_2025,\n\taddress = {Brooklyn, NY},\n\ttitle = {Shaper of {God}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-945711-22-0},\n\tabstract = {The richly illustrated Shaper of God is a compelling exploration of the legacy of science-fiction writer Octavia E. Butler (1947-2006), reimagined through the visionary lens of American Artist (born 1989). American Artist's multidisciplinary approach delves into three pivotal themes of Butler's oeuvre: the profound impact of her family's migration; the role of Pasadena and Los Angeles, with their distinct academic, scientific and natural landscapes; and her critical engagement with space exploration, interrogating its implications for Black and Indigenous communities. This book features American Artist's video, installation, sculpture and drawing, alongside essays, exhibition documentation and a compilation of diverse mediums, including sketches, digital communications and archival materials, inviting readers to reconsider history, technology and identity. This volume is an essential resource for understanding both Butler's groundbreaking narratives and the contemporary issues they continue to shape.},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tpublisher = {Pioneer Works Press},\n\tauthor = {Artist, American},\n\tcollaborator = {{Pioneer Works} and Aliyu, Zainab and Aldridge, Taylor Renee and Cournum, Lou and Due, Tananarive and Gumbs, Alexis Pauline and Jamieson, Ayana and Moten, Fred},\n\tyear = {2025},\n\tkeywords = {Artist, American, 1989-, Butler, Octavia E., Exhibitions, Sculpture, Modern, United States, Video art},\n}\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Meat Politics and Vegan Sensibilities: A Marxist Feminist Study of Animal Ecologies in Octavia Estelle Butler's Parable Novels.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Shakir, F.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Pakistan Journal of American Studies, 43(1): 1–30. 2025.\n Num Pages: 31\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Meat$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

\n

@article{butler_meat_2025,\n\taddress = {Islamabad, Pakistan},\n\ttitle = {Meat {Politics} and {Vegan} {Sensibilities}: {A} {Marxist} {Feminist} {Study} of {Animal} {Ecologies} in {Octavia} {Estelle} {Butler}'s {Parable} {Novels}},\n\tvolume = {43},\n\tcopyright = {Copyright Area Study Centre for Africa, North \\& South America 2025},\n\tissn = {1011811X},\n\tshorttitle = {Meat {Politics} and {Vegan} {Sensibilities}},\n\turl = {https://www.proquest.com/docview/3288132075?pq-origsite=gscholar&fromopenview=true&sourcetype=Scholarly%20Journals},\n\tabstract = {This interdisciplinary study traces meat politics, animal exploitation, and feminist-vegan sensibilities in Octavia E. Butler's parable novels in light of Carol J. Adams' and Carol Sanchez's works in the intersectional African-American Marxist feminist tradition. As part of canine studies, the main argument of the article hinges on the debate between Black ecofeminists and feminists for animal rights in conjunction with Black women's rights. Pertaining to address the racist, sexist, and anti-specisist traditions of onto-epistemological explorations and environmental policies, the under-developed discussions on Black women's rights and animalities in conjunction to animal rights need further thought and discussion. Although Black ecofeminists actively advance various parallels between animals' and women's oppression in the American racially segregated patriarchal world, different aspects regarding women's humanness are generally ignored in this environment-friendly activism. While considering this flaw, the current study highlights the need of the Black feminist-vegan sensibilities in this textually evaluated qualitative analysis concerning the American community of color, especially under Trump's administration in the twenty-first century post-racial America. The key aspect of animalness versus humanness is the main trope of debate, while destabilizing patriarchal agency through women's empowerment and animals' separate status are highlighted. It is found that predator dogs apart from speciesism necessitate Black women's evacuation for their survival and protection from scavenging. In this case, Vegan Feminists promote empathy for muted animals in an anti-racist, anti-gendered, and anti-violence society, while calling for women's consideration as equal to men in their humanness and able to survive with equity-based human rights. This animalness versus humanness debate, nevertheless, criticizes the American capitalist system that marginalizes Black women for their closer relatability to animals as absent referents to replenish meat fetish. Therefore, this study endeavors to shed light on vegan food choices, animals' violent nature as symbolic of their exploitation, and Lauren as the feminist savior not only for enslaved Black women but also for animals. The paper aims to examine the feminists' role in challenging the slavocratic promotion of meat and shock collars as socio-political tools of oppression, which have been used to control both animals and women, thereby creating socio-economic, political, and racial impacts.},\n\tlanguage = {English},\n\tnumber = {1},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tjournal = {Pakistan Journal of American Studies},\n\tpublisher = {Area Study Centre for Africa, North \\& South America},\n\tauthor = {Shakir, Farheen},\n\tcollaborator = {Butler, Octavia E.},\n\tyear = {2025},\n\tnote = {Num Pages: 31},\n\tkeywords = {Activism, African Americans, Animal human relations, Animal rights, Animals, Black people, Black women, Capitalism, Debates, Dogs, Ecofeminism, Empathy, Empowerment, Environmental policy, Epistemology, Evacuation, Evacuation of civilians, Exploitation, Feminism, Human rights, Interdisciplinary aspects, Intersectionality, Marxist analysis, Meat, Novels, Oppression, Patriarchy, Politics, Qualitative research, Racial segregation, Racism, Referents, Sexism, Socioeconomic factors, Traditions, Veganism, Vegetarianism, Women, Womens rights},\n\tpages = {1--30},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\n

\n\n\n

\n This interdisciplinary study traces meat politics, animal exploitation, and feminist-vegan sensibilities in Octavia E. Butler's parable novels in light of Carol J. Adams' and Carol Sanchez's works in the intersectional African-American Marxist feminist tradition. As part of canine studies, the main argument of the article hinges on the debate between Black ecofeminists and feminists for animal rights in conjunction with Black women's rights. Pertaining to address the racist, sexist, and anti-specisist traditions of onto-epistemological explorations and environmental policies, the under-developed discussions on Black women's rights and animalities in conjunction to animal rights need further thought and discussion. Although Black ecofeminists actively advance various parallels between animals' and women's oppression in the American racially segregated patriarchal world, different aspects regarding women's humanness are generally ignored in this environment-friendly activism. While considering this flaw, the current study highlights the need of the Black feminist-vegan sensibilities in this textually evaluated qualitative analysis concerning the American community of color, especially under Trump's administration in the twenty-first century post-racial America. The key aspect of animalness versus humanness is the main trope of debate, while destabilizing patriarchal agency through women's empowerment and animals' separate status are highlighted. It is found that predator dogs apart from speciesism necessitate Black women's evacuation for their survival and protection from scavenging. In this case, Vegan Feminists promote empathy for muted animals in an anti-racist, anti-gendered, and anti-violence society, while calling for women's consideration as equal to men in their humanness and able to survive with equity-based human rights. This animalness versus humanness debate, nevertheless, criticizes the American capitalist system that marginalizes Black women for their closer relatability to animals as absent referents to replenish meat fetish. Therefore, this study endeavors to shed light on vegan food choices, animals' violent nature as symbolic of their exploitation, and Lauren as the feminist savior not only for enslaved Black women but also for animals. The paper aims to examine the feminists' role in challenging the slavocratic promotion of meat and shock collars as socio-political tools of oppression, which have been used to control both animals and women, thereby creating socio-economic, political, and racial impacts.\n

\n\n\n

\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n The Ontology of the Ship: Celestial Ecologies in Tade Thompson’s Rosewater and Octavia Butler’s Dawn.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Dunning, S. K.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Caliban. French Journal of English Studies, (74). September 2025.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"The$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{dunning_ontology_2025,\n\ttitle = {The {Ontology} of the {Ship}: {Celestial} {Ecologies} in {Tade} {Thompson}’s {Rosewater} and {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Dawn}},\n\tcopyright = {https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/},\n\tissn = {2425-6250},\n\tshorttitle = {The {Ontology} of the {Ship}},\n\turl = {https://journals.openedition.org/caliban/14755},\n\tdoi = {10.4000/1536f},\n\tabstract = {This essay argues that our discourses about objects, specifically space ships, can be read ontologically because our construction of space ships reflects dimensions of affect relative to our own being. Looking specifically at two science fiction texts, Octavia Butler’s Dawn (1987) and Tade Thompson’s Rosewater (2016), the author demonstrates that the representation of a living ship in these texts contests Enlightenment constructions of the human in ways that suggest engagement with outer space and the celestial elsewhere can be reimagined as an abolitionist, with abolition understood in the Afropessimist sense of an ultimate end to the social and political conditions inaugurated by the transatlantic slave trade, turn towards ecological redemption and as the resolution of relational crisis characterized by racialized and gendered systems of power. This essay considers how the presence of an organic, living ship in Black science fiction texts alters our ontological landscape and then speculates about the implications of a philosophy of deep connection and its possibility to transform human experience through an abolitionist defeat of the ideological binary that defined humans as “separate” from the environment.},\n\tlanguage = {en},\n\tnumber = {74},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tjournal = {Caliban. French Journal of English Studies},\n\tpublisher = {Presses universitaires du Mirail},\n\tauthor = {Dunning, Stefanie K.},\n\tmonth = sep,\n\tyear = {2025},\n\tkeywords = {Butler Octavia, Thompson Tade, african futurism, afrofuturism, ontology, outer space, speculative fiction},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2024\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Black speculative feminisms: memory and liberated futures in Black women's fiction.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Jones, C. L.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n of New suns: race, gender, and sexuality in the speculativeThe Ohio State University Press, Columbus, 2024.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@book{jones_black_2024,\n\taddress = {Columbus},\n\tseries = {New suns: race, gender, and sexuality in the speculative},\n\ttitle = {Black speculative feminisms: memory and liberated futures in {Black} women's fiction},\n\tisbn = {978-0-8142-1540-1},\n\tshorttitle = {Black speculative feminisms},\n\tabstract = {"How do Black women writing speculative fiction explore the use of memory as a potential strategy for liberation? In 'Black Speculative Feminisms', Cassandra L. Jones looks at the writings of Octavia E. Butler, Tananarive Due, Nalo Hopkinson, Rasheedah Phillips, and Nnedi Okorafor to chart those moments where characters harness, or fail to harness, the power of memory. These instances transform memory--individual and collective, bodily and archival--from passive recollection into direct or indirect social action. Taking a Black feminist approach, Jones addresses several emancipatory themes within Afrofuturism: the decolonization of time that can be found in fiction employing non-Western and non-linear expressions of time, exploring futurity and the projection of a full range of expressions of Black humanity into anticipated futures, and imagining new worlds and novel approaches to old problems. Drawing on critical fabulation and restorative justice, she forwards restorative fabulation as the mechanism by which speculative fiction offers a healing site for authors and readers to process generational trauma while imagining more equitable futures" -- Page 4 of cover.},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tpublisher = {The Ohio State University Press},\n\tauthor = {Jones, Cassandra L.},\n\tyear = {2024},\n\tkeywords = {African American authors, African American feminists, African American feminists., American fiction, History and criticism, Speculative fiction, Women authors},\n}\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2023\n \n \n (4)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Hyperobjects and Hyperempathy in Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Messimer, M.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Messimer, M., editor(s), Apocalyptic California: Gender in Climate Fiction, pages 65–89. Springer Nature Switzerland, Cham, 2023.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Hyperobjects$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{messimer_hyperobjects_2023,\n\taddress = {Cham},\n\ttitle = {Hyperobjects and {Hyperempathy} in {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} of the {Sower}},\n\tisbn = {978-3-031-29920-9},\n\turl = {https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-29920-9_4},\n\tdoi = {10.1007/978-3-031-29920-9_4},\n\tabstract = {This chapter ties together theories of slow violence, cruel optimism, and hyperobjects. Timothy Morton’s term hyperobjects describes things that are too enormous and yet all-encompassing for human minds to truly understand and respond to. In Octavia Butler’s novel Parable of the Sower, her main character suffers from a fictional condition called hyperempathy. I argue that this hyperempathy is one response to encountering hyperobjects. Because Butler’s character can feel the pain of others, she cannot deny the impacts she has on other people, nonhumans, and the world. This forces her into a mode of utopian thinking that faces the realities of the constantly changing world in climate change and social upheaval. Only through feeling radical empathy can Butler’s character imagine a new way of being that does not perpetuate the harm that caused climate change.},\n\tlanguage = {en},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tbooktitle = {Apocalyptic {California}: {Gender} in {Climate} {Fiction}},\n\tpublisher = {Springer Nature Switzerland},\n\tauthor = {Messimer, MaryKate},\n\teditor = {Messimer, MaryKate},\n\tyear = {2023},\n\tkeywords = {California, Climate fiction, Octavia Butler, Queer ecologies, Trans-corporeality},\n\tpages = {65--89},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Women and Cli-fi: Ecological Science Fiction in the Time of the 'Manthropocene'.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Verardi, G.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Foundation, 52(146): 34–46. 2023.\n Num Pages: 34-46\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Women$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{atwood_women_2023,\n\taddress = {Dagenham, United Kingdom},\n\ttitle = {Women and {Cli}-fi: {Ecological} {Science} {Fiction} in the {Time} of the '{Manthropocene}'},\n\tvolume = {52},\n\tcopyright = {Copyright Science Fiction Foundation 2023},\n\tissn = {03064964},\n\tshorttitle = {Women and {Cli}-fi},\n\turl = {https://www.proquest.com/docview/2894970486/abstract/83E7BC0923A74686PQ/1},\n\tabstract = {Over the last two decades, the number of fictions about climate change, global warming, and environmental issues has escalated, reflecting the current problems that our planet and our societies are dealing with. Unstable weather conditions, droughts, forest fires and floods are part of the daily news, as well as the Covid-19 pandemic which, three years later, still affects people around the world. By approaching the environmental debate through the literary field, the genre of climate fiction invites us to become aware of the urgency of the moment, not only by depicting the disastrous consequences that anthropogenic climate change can bring but also by offering possibilities for rethinking our social system to avoid environmental catastrophe. Derived from science fiction, the term 'climate fiction', or 'cli-fi', was first coined in 2008 by Dan Bloom, who identified a new genre of novels, short stories and movies dealing with a disruption of the Earth's climate caused by human activities. This article approaches the debate about women's role in reshaping science fiction through the subgenre of climate fiction, and, in particular, through the cli-fi novels written by Ursula Le Guin, Octavia Butler and Margaret Atwood. The first part highlights the way their novels imagine the transformation of societies based on violence into post-patriarchal communities in harmony with the natural world; the second part explores the sf criticism and theories that these writers have developed; and the last part argues that these writers have revised science fiction, a genre which has been predominantly associated with white male authors and male heroes, and in which women, LGBTQ and people of colour were often underrepresented both as writers and as characters.},\n\tlanguage = {English},\n\tnumber = {146},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tjournal = {Foundation},\n\tpublisher = {Science Fiction Foundation},\n\tauthor = {Verardi, Giulia},\n\tcollaborator = {Atwood, Margaret (1939-) and Butler, Octavia E. and Le Guin, Ursula K. (1929-2018)},\n\tyear = {2023},\n\tnote = {Num Pages: 34-46},\n\tkeywords = {African American literature, American Indians, American literature, Anthropocentrism, Canadian literature, Climate change, Earth, Environmental impact, Genre, Geography, Geology, Oral literature, Pandemics, Science fiction \\& fantasy, Society, Speculative fiction, Violence, Women},\n\tpages = {34--46},\n}\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Speculating Sustainability: Framing Octavia E. Butler’s Science Fiction Writing Within Sustainability Issues.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Pierre, L.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In The Palgrave Handbook of Global Sustainability, pages 2361–2368. Springer International Publishing, Cham, 2023.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{pierre_speculating_2023,\n\taddress = {Cham},\n\ttitle = {Speculating {Sustainability}: {Framing} {Octavia} {E}. {Butler}’s {Science} {Fiction} {Writing} {Within} {Sustainability} {Issues}},\n\tisbn = {978-3-031-01948-7},\n\tshorttitle = {Speculating {Sustainability}},\n\tdoi = {10.1007/978-3-031-01949-4_8},\n\tabstract = {Octavia E. Butler, a speculative and science fiction writer, often considered the mother of Afrofuturism, is a prime example of taking the freedom of science fiction and examining the future of humans as they relate to the environment. Through the exploration of text and audio interviews of Octavia Butler, this chapter highlights that she not only considered race, class, gender, and culture in her writings; but she also was deeply informed by the environment and its impact on society. Using Brinkmann’s framing of surfing sustainability, suffering sustainability, and the impending Anthropocene, this chapter discusses how Octavia Butler’s work deals with the possible result of what happens when all three actors meet. This chapter connects Octavia Butler’s words of “speculating” “what if, if only, and if this goes on” to sustainability and the themes of her novels and short stories. It is proposed that Octavia Butler through a science fiction lens was speculating sustainability.},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tbooktitle = {The {Palgrave} {Handbook} of {Global} {Sustainability}},\n\tpublisher = {Springer International Publishing},\n\tauthor = {Pierre, Lisa-Marie},\n\tcollaborator = {Brinkmann, Robert},\n\tyear = {2023},\n\tkeywords = {Ecology, Science fiction, Sustainability},\n\tpages = {2361--2368},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Teaching for a Habitable Future with Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower: “We’ll Have to Seed Ourselves Farther and Farther from This Dying Place”.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Katopodis, C.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n English Language Notes, 61(1): 77–94. April 2023.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Teaching$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{katopodis_teaching_2023,\n\ttitle = {Teaching for a {Habitable} {Future} with {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} of the {Sower}: “{We}’ll {Have} to {Seed} {Ourselves} {Farther} and {Farther} from {This} {Dying} {Place}”},\n\tvolume = {61},\n\tissn = {0013-8282},\n\tshorttitle = {Teaching for a {Habitable} {Future} with {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} of the {Sower}},\n\turl = {https://doi.org/10.1215/00138282-10293184},\n\tdoi = {10.1215/00138282-10293184},\n\tabstract = {This essay draws on the author’s experiences teaching in the fall of 2020 and serving as associate director of the City University of New York’s Transformative Learning in the Humanities initiative to propose and describe an “environmental” or “habitable pedagogy” for the twenty-first century.},\n\tnumber = {1},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tjournal = {English Language Notes},\n\tauthor = {Katopodis, Christina},\n\tmonth = apr,\n\tyear = {2023},\n\tpages = {77--94},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2022\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n The Fourth World Resurgent: Gerald Vizenor’s Bearheart and Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Stewart, A.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Angry Planet, of Decolonial Fiction and the American Third World, pages 141–174. University of Minnesota Press, 2022.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"The$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{stewart_fourth_2022,\n\tseries = {Decolonial {Fiction} and the {American} {Third} {World}},\n\ttitle = {The {Fourth} {World} {Resurgent}: {Gerald} {Vizenor}’s {Bearheart} and {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} of the {Sower}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-5179-1411-0},\n\tshorttitle = {The {Fourth} {World} {Resurgent}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctv2ckjq8k.7},\n\tabstract = {I grew up on Treaty One territory, in the Canadian city of Winnipeg, which is built at the confluence of two unmanageable rivers: the Red and the Assiniboine. These rivers are the reason for Winnipeg’s location in what First Nations call “the Heart of Turtle Island.”¹ It is not exactly prime real estate by colonial modernity’s standards, but it is at the center of the continent. The pulse of life created by the rivers’ intersection has resulted in the area functioning as a major transportation hub for thousands of years. And yet, these rivers have never been easy to live},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tbooktitle = {Angry {Planet}},\n\tpublisher = {University of Minnesota Press},\n\tauthor = {Stewart, Anne},\n\tyear = {2022},\n\tpages = {141--174},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2021\n \n \n (5)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n War and Ecocriticism.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Wright, L.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Haytock, J., editor(s), War and American Literature, of Cambridge Themes in American Literature and Culture, pages 301–314. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2021.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"War$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{haytock_war_2021,\n\taddress = {Cambridge},\n\tseries = {Cambridge {Themes} in {American} {Literature} and {Culture}},\n\ttitle = {War and {Ecocriticism}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-108-49680-3},\n\turl = {https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/war-and-american-literature/war-and-ecocriticism/1CF29743FA4E5323C260DF141271F484},\n\tdoi = {10.1017/9781108654883.025},\n\tabstract = {This essay links the environmental resistance embodied by Edward Abbey’s Hayduke in The Monkey Wrench Gang after the Vietnam War and the speculatively fictional future of Octavia Butler’s Olamina’s ecofeminist resistance (The Parable of the Talents) to a war that seems all too imminent in the contemporary US, a place where climate change denial is political policy and the interests of fossil fuel magnates matter more than the lives of individual citizens. This essay explores how American ecocriticism interrogates and informs our conceptions of war, whom we are fighting, and the ways that war generates environmental exigency.},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tbooktitle = {War and {American} {Literature}},\n\tpublisher = {Cambridge University Press},\n\tauthor = {Wright, Laura},\n\teditor = {Haytock, Jennifer},\n\tyear = {2021},\n\tkeywords = {Edward Abbey, Octavia Butler, US war and ecocriticism},\n\tpages = {301--314},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Ghosts and Reparations: Thinking through Enslavement and Climate Futures with Octavia Butler.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Fiskio, J.,\n editor.\n \n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Fiskio, J., editor(s), Climate Change, Literature, and Environmental Justice: Poetics of Dissent and Repair, pages 52–79. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2021.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Ghosts$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{fiskio_ghosts_2021,\n\taddress = {Cambridge},\n\ttitle = {Ghosts and {Reparations}: {Thinking} through {Enslavement} and {Climate} {Futures} with {Octavia} {Butler}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-108-84067-5},\n\tshorttitle = {Ghosts and {Reparations}},\n\turl = {https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/climate-change-literature-and-environmental-justice/ghosts-and-reparations/AA21C21AED92D524252F01E4F34805BD},\n\tdoi = {10.1017/9781108886819.003},\n\tabstract = {This chapter argues that climate justice must be understood in the context of reparations for enslavement and requires a speculative recentering of history. Climate ethics often employs the lenses of corrective justice, the payment of debt, and distributive justice, the equitable sharing of benefits and burdens of greenhouse gas production. Placing climate disruption in the history of diaspora and enslavement allows for a theorization of reparative justice. In making this argument, I dialogue with the work of Octavia Butler, whose novels Kindred, Parable of the Sower, and Parable of the Talents imagine climate futures without seeking to escape responsibilities to the past. Furthermore, Butler’s alternative history and speculative fiction place African American resistance, and especially African American women’s creation of freedom, at the center of history and the construction of more just and sustainable futures.},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tbooktitle = {Climate {Change}, {Literature}, and {Environmental} {Justice}: {Poetics} of {Dissent} and {Repair}},\n\tpublisher = {Cambridge University Press},\n\teditor = {Fiskio, Janet},\n\tyear = {2021},\n\tkeywords = {Octavia Butler, cancer alley, neoslave narratives, reparations, speculative fiction},\n\tpages = {52--79},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Octavia Butler’s Parable Novels and Genealogies of African American Environmental Literature.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Modestino, K.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Resilience: A Journal of the Environmental Humanities, 9(1): 56–79. 2021.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Octavia$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{modestino_octavia_2021,\n\ttitle = {Octavia {Butler}’s {Parable} {Novels} and {Genealogies} of {African} {American} {Environmental} {Literature}},\n\tvolume = {9},\n\tissn = {2330-8117},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/27142148},\n\tnumber = {1},\n\turldate = {2026-07-30},\n\tjournal = {Resilience: A Journal of the Environmental Humanities},\n\tpublisher = {University of Nebraska Press},\n\tauthor = {Modestino, Kevin},\n\tyear = {2021},\n\tpages = {56--79},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n An Ecofeminist Reading of Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower and Parable of Talents.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Tüzün, H. Ö.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Dystopias and Utopias on Earth and Beyond. Routledge, 2021.\n Num Pages: 14\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{tuzun_ecofeminist_2021,\n\ttitle = {An {Ecofeminist} {Reading} of {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} of the {Sower} and {Parable} of {Talents}},\n\tabstract = {A multiple recipient of the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards, the African American writer Octavia Estelle Butler successfully employs the science fiction genre as a platform upon which she discusses contemporary issues such as climate change, gender and racial discrimination, and class conflict in a futuristic setting. Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (1998) are two of her critically acclaimed speculative science fiction novels in which Butler employs many tenets of ecofeminism which uses gender as a vantage point to examine the conditions that cause and perpetuate the subordination of both women and nature.\n                     \n                        The Parable of the Sower comprises journal entries written by the protagonist, Lauren Oya Olamina—a fifteen-year-old African American woman who has hyperempathy syndrome, which is a psychosomatic disorder that makes her experience other people’s feelings as her own. Events described in the novel begin in post-apocalyptic southern California, where the climate is warming, food is scarce, and violence and racial turmoil are rampant. When her community is eventually overrun, Lauren manages to escape with other survivors, disguising herself as a man. She gradually develops her own belief system called Earthseed which locates God in change, chaos, and uncertainty, and aims to prepare humankind to take root among the stars. Lauren ends up founding a utopian commune out in the woods with a couple of likeminded people who learn new and better forms of relating to each other and to the world around them. In the Parable of the Talents, the commune gets smashed and many, including children and Lauren’s husband, get killed.\n                     Both Earthseed novels reflect Butler’s view of humanity as inherently flawed by an innate tendency for hierarchical thinking which leads to intolerance and violence and is manifest in sexism, racism, and ethnocentricism that cause widespread suffering in the world. Like ecofeminists, Butler sees domination of the weak by the strong as a form of parasitism and offers a powerful critique of patriarchal society and its structures of domination. I would thus argue that the Earthseed novels are classic ecofeminist texts in their exploration of intersections of oppression and their visceral portrayal of connections between harmful practices that exploit the environment and social structures that oppress women among other groups. Drawing on theoretical debates in the field of ecofeminism, this chapter critically examines Octavia Butler’s treatment of spiritual and transformative ecofeminist ideas in Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents.},\n\tbooktitle = {Dystopias and {Utopias} on {Earth} and {Beyond}},\n\tpublisher = {Routledge},\n\tauthor = {Tüzün, Hatice Övgü},\n\tyear = {2021},\n\tnote = {Num Pages: 14},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\n

\n\n\n

\n A multiple recipient of the prestigious Hugo and Nebula awards, the African American writer Octavia Estelle Butler successfully employs the science fiction genre as a platform upon which she discusses contemporary issues such as climate change, gender and racial discrimination, and class conflict in a futuristic setting. Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (1998) are two of her critically acclaimed speculative science fiction novels in which Butler employs many tenets of ecofeminism which uses gender as a vantage point to examine the conditions that cause and perpetuate the subordination of both women and nature. The Parable of the Sower comprises journal entries written by the protagonist, Lauren Oya Olamina—a fifteen-year-old African American woman who has hyperempathy syndrome, which is a psychosomatic disorder that makes her experience other people’s feelings as her own. Events described in the novel begin in post-apocalyptic southern California, where the climate is warming, food is scarce, and violence and racial turmoil are rampant. When her community is eventually overrun, Lauren manages to escape with other survivors, disguising herself as a man. She gradually develops her own belief system called Earthseed which locates God in change, chaos, and uncertainty, and aims to prepare humankind to take root among the stars. Lauren ends up founding a utopian commune out in the woods with a couple of likeminded people who learn new and better forms of relating to each other and to the world around them. In the Parable of the Talents, the commune gets smashed and many, including children and Lauren’s husband, get killed. Both Earthseed novels reflect Butler’s view of humanity as inherently flawed by an innate tendency for hierarchical thinking which leads to intolerance and violence and is manifest in sexism, racism, and ethnocentricism that cause widespread suffering in the world. Like ecofeminists, Butler sees domination of the weak by the strong as a form of parasitism and offers a powerful critique of patriarchal society and its structures of domination. I would thus argue that the Earthseed novels are classic ecofeminist texts in their exploration of intersections of oppression and their visceral portrayal of connections between harmful practices that exploit the environment and social structures that oppress women among other groups. Drawing on theoretical debates in the field of ecofeminism, this chapter critically examines Octavia Butler’s treatment of spiritual and transformative ecofeminist ideas in Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents.\n

\n\n\n

\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Apocalypse as Field of Sense: Markus Gabriel’s Ontology of Fields of Sense and Octavia Butler’s Parable Series.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Kaup, M.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In New Ecological Realisms, of Post-Apocalyptic Fiction and Contemporary Theory, pages 196–252. Edinburgh University Press, 2021.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Apocalypse$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{kaup_apocalypse_2021,\n\tseries = {Post-{Apocalyptic} {Fiction} and {Contemporary} {Theory}},\n\ttitle = {Apocalypse as {Field} of {Sense}: {Markus} {Gabriel}’s {Ontology} of {Fields} of {Sense} and {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} {Series}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-4744-8309-4},\n\tshorttitle = {Apocalypse as {Field} of {Sense}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctv1nwbqdc.9},\n\tabstract = {This chapter turns to another variety of what I call ‘new ecological realisms’ after poststructuralism, Markus Gabriel’s new realist ontology of fields of sense. Among the new realisms discussed in this study, Gabriel’s is the most programmatic in announcing the exhaustion of postmodernism and locating his new realist ontology in the post-postmodernist era: ‘New realism describes a philosophical stance that designates the era after so-called post-modernity . . . new realism is nothing more than the name for the age after postmodernity’ ( \\textit{Why the World}  1–2). Gabriel builds on the arguments of several contemporary philosophers from both the continental},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tbooktitle = {New {Ecological} {Realisms}},\n\tpublisher = {Edinburgh University Press},\n\tauthor = {Kaup, Monika},\n\tyear = {2021},\n\tpages = {196--252},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2020\n \n \n (3)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Speculative Writing, Art, and World-Making in the Wake of Octavia E. Butler as Feminist Theory.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Streeby, S.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Feminist Studies, 46(2): 510–533. 2020.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Speculative$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{streeby_speculative_2020,\n\ttitle = {Speculative {Writing}, {Art}, and {World}-{Making} in the {Wake} of {Octavia} {E}. {Butler} as {Feminist} {Theory}},\n\tvolume = {46},\n\tissn = {0046-3663},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.15767/feministstudies.46.2.0510},\n\tdoi = {10.15767/feministstudies.46.2.0510},\n\tnumber = {2},\n\turldate = {2026-09-02},\n\tjournal = {Feminist Studies},\n\tpublisher = {Feminist Studies, Inc.},\n\tauthor = {Streeby, Shelley},\n\tyear = {2020},\n\tpages = {510--533},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Readings into the Plantationocene: FROM THE SLAVE NARRATIVE OF CHARLES BALL TO THE SPECULATIVE HISTORIES OF OCTAVIA BUTLER AND NNEDI OKORAFOR.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n McCORKLE, J.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Iheka, C.; and Newell, S., editor(s), ALT 38 Environmental Transformations, of African Literature Today, pages 122–133. Boydell & Brewer, 2020.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Readings$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n \n doi\n \n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@incollection{mccorkle_readings_2020,\n\tseries = {African {Literature} {Today}},\n\ttitle = {Readings into the {Plantationocene}: {FROM} {THE} {SLAVE} {NARRATIVE} {OF} {CHARLES} {BALL} {TO} {THE} {SPECULATIVE} {HISTORIES} {OF} {OCTAVIA} {BUTLER} {AND} {NNEDI} {OKORAFOR}},\n\tshorttitle = {Readings into the {Plantationocene}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv105bbzf.13},\n\tdoi = {10.2307/j.ctv105bbzf.13},\n\tabstract = {Octavia Butler’s  \\textit{Parable of the Sower}  and Nnedi Okorafor’s  \\textit{Who Fears Death}  consider environmental catastrophes structured as narratives of captivity and escape, and propose a problematized feminist teleology. Reading Butler again in the age of Trump with economic disparities, the denial of the global climate crisis, and the backdrop of the extended fire season (stretching into nearly the entire year) in southern California, continent-wide brush fires in Australia, and years-long drought in southern Africa makes her all the more prescient. Commenting in 2017, Okorafor stated, ‘After everything that happened, I’m not reading 1984, I’m not reading  \\textit{Fahrenheit 451} , I’m not},\n\turldate = {2026-08-06},\n\tbooktitle = {{ALT} 38 {Environmental} {Transformations}},\n\tpublisher = {Boydell \\& Brewer},\n\tauthor = {McCORKLE, James},\n\teditor = {Iheka, Cajetan and Newell, Stephanie},\n\tyear = {2020},\n\tpages = {122--133},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Apocalypse, Afrofutures, and Theories of “the Living” beyond Human Rights: Octavia E. Butler’s Parable Series.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Sneed, C.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Bloomsbury Handbook to Octavia E. Butler, pages 181–200. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2020.\n \n\n\n\n
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@incollection{sneed_apocalypse_2020,\n\ttitle = {Apocalypse, {Afrofutures}, and {Theories} of “the {Living}” beyond {Human} {Rights}: {Octavia} {E}. {Butler}’s {Parable} {Series}},\n\tisbn = {978-1-350-07966-3},\n\tshorttitle = {Apocalypse, {Afrofutures}, and {Theories} of “the {Living}” beyond {Human} {Rights}},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tbooktitle = {Bloomsbury {Handbook} to {Octavia} {E}. {Butler}},\n\tpublisher = {Bloomsbury Publishing Plc},\n\tauthor = {Sneed, Chriss},\n\tyear = {2020},\n\tpages = {181--200},\n}\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2019\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n Amalgamation: Octavia Butler’s Lilith’s Brood.\n \n \n \n\n\n \n Idema, T.; and Idema, T.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Stages of Transmutation, pages 137–165. Routledge, 1 edition, 2019.\n \n\n\n\n
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@incollection{idema_amalgamation_2019,\n\tedition = {1},\n\ttitle = {Amalgamation: {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Lilith}’s {Brood}},\n\tisbn = {978-0-415-78822-9},\n\tshorttitle = {Amalgamation},\n\tdoi = {10.4324/9781315225470-5},\n\tabstract = {Alien encounter, one of the most popular themes in science fiction, is paradigmatically undergirded by a telos of preserving human autonomy (Malmgren). In the majority of alien encounter stories, from H.G. Wells’s novel\nThe War of the Worlds\n(1898) to Roland Emmerich’s film\nIndependence Day\n(1996), the prime strategy for preserving autonomy is warfare. Stories about “alien love” such as E.T. The Extra-terrestrial are exceptional in the sense that they relinquish violence, but here, too, there is a humanist ideology at work that sets humanity apart from its “others” (Badmington 6, 63). Many of these stories are not about encounter at all but about its evasion. Especially beyond Hollywood cinema, however, there are plenty of exceptions to this rule. In Arthur C. Clarke’s science fiction classic\nChildhood’s End\n(1953), humanity is destined to merge with extraterrestrial “Overlords,” who turn out to be mere messengers of a central “Overmind,” a pure, disembodied abstraction controlling the universe, incorporating everything into itself. Although there is resistance to the transformation, eventually, any notion of individual, human autonomy is lost in the presence of the Overlords. Here, human existence reaches a kind of immanence, critiquing the modern division between (animal) body and (human) mind, although the story can also be read as a transhumanist fantasy of transcendence, reaching a pure state of energy and information independent of matter. Whereas the novel is posthumanist in the sense of the human being subsumed into a larger cosmic story, it avoids thinking through the consequences of human-nonhuman encounter, keeping both races mostly separate and ending in a kind of unnarratable unification. Only rarely do science fiction authors develop stories of sustained human-alien contact in which both parties transform. Works of feminist science fiction authors such as Ursula Le Guin, Joanna Russ, Naomi Mitchison, Marge Piercy, and Octavia Butler are remarkable in this regard.},\n\tlanguage = {eng},\n\tbooktitle = {Stages of {Transmutation}},\n\tpublisher = {Routledge},\n\tauthor = {Idema, Tom and Idema, Tom},\n\tyear = {2019},\n\tpages = {137--165},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n Alien encounter, one of the most popular themes in science fiction, is paradigmatically undergirded by a telos of preserving human autonomy (Malmgren). In the majority of alien encounter stories, from H.G. Wells’s novel The War of the Worlds (1898) to Roland Emmerich’s film Independence Day (1996), the prime strategy for preserving autonomy is warfare. Stories about “alien love” such as E.T. The Extra-terrestrial are exceptional in the sense that they relinquish violence, but here, too, there is a humanist ideology at work that sets humanity apart from its “others” (Badmington 6, 63). Many of these stories are not about encounter at all but about its evasion. Especially beyond Hollywood cinema, however, there are plenty of exceptions to this rule. In Arthur C. Clarke’s science fiction classic Childhood’s End (1953), humanity is destined to merge with extraterrestrial “Overlords,” who turn out to be mere messengers of a central “Overmind,” a pure, disembodied abstraction controlling the universe, incorporating everything into itself. Although there is resistance to the transformation, eventually, any notion of individual, human autonomy is lost in the presence of the Overlords. Here, human existence reaches a kind of immanence, critiquing the modern division between (animal) body and (human) mind, although the story can also be read as a transhumanist fantasy of transcendence, reaching a pure state of energy and information independent of matter. Whereas the novel is posthumanist in the sense of the human being subsumed into a larger cosmic story, it avoids thinking through the consequences of human-nonhuman encounter, keeping both races mostly separate and ending in a kind of unnarratable unification. Only rarely do science fiction authors develop stories of sustained human-alien contact in which both parties transform. Works of feminist science fiction authors such as Ursula Le Guin, Joanna Russ, Naomi Mitchison, Marge Piercy, and Octavia Butler are remarkable in this regard.\n

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\n \n 2018\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n EARTHSEEDS OF CHANGE: Postapocalyptic Mythmaking, Race, and Ecology in The Book of Eli and Octavia Butler’s Womanist Parables.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Williams, K. D. H.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n In Nishime, L.; and Williams, K. D. H., editor(s), Racial Ecologies, pages 234–249. University of Washington Press, 2018.\n \n\n\n\n
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@incollection{williams_earthseeds_2018,\n\ttitle = {{EARTHSEEDS} {OF} {CHANGE}: {Postapocalyptic} {Mythmaking}, {Race}, and {Ecology} in {The} {Book} of {Eli} and {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Womanist} {Parables}},\n\tisbn = {978-0-295-74371-4},\n\tshorttitle = {{EARTHSEEDS} {OF} {CHANGE}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvcwnm95.20},\n\tabstract = {Taken from her collection  \\textit{Mercy} , Lucille Clifton’s “mulberry fields” expresses images of a master’s table where there is only “one plate” and forsaken ground where seeds cannot flourish. Clifton’s poetics of domination, neglect, and death, posed against the determination of “wild” life to “bloom,” gestures toward my central concern: the material and imaginative relation between race and ecology. I focus here on apocalyptic speculative narratives that reify yet also reenvision the relationship between race and “nature.” The racial speculative narrative exposes the enduring, false claims of a post–civil rights and postracial society while imagining how humans in ecological decline},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tbooktitle = {Racial {Ecologies}},\n\tpublisher = {University of Washington Press},\n\tauthor = {Williams, Kim D. Hester},\n\teditor = {Nishime, Leilani and Williams, Kim D. Hester},\n\tyear = {2018},\n\tpages = {234--249},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2017\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Migrants and Disaster Subcultures in the Late Anthropocene: An Ecocritical Reading of Octavia Butler’s Parable Novels.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Federmayer, É.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies (HJEAS), 23(2): 347–370. 2017.\n \n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n \n \n $\"Migrants$ Paper\n \n \n\n \n\n \n link\n \n \n\n bibtex\n \n\n \n \n \n abstract \n \n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n \n\n\n\n

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@article{federmayer_migrants_2017,\n\ttitle = {Migrants and {Disaster} {Subcultures} in the {Late} {Anthropocene}: {An} {Ecocritical} {Reading} of {Octavia} {Butler}’s {Parable} {Novels}},\n\tvolume = {23},\n\tissn = {1218-7364},\n\tshorttitle = {Migrants and {Disaster} {Subcultures} in the {Late} {Anthropocene}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/26894884},\n\tabstract = {Affected by a shocking concatenation of ecological, economic, and political disasters, black, white, and multiracial characters in Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (1998) seek to cope with apparently insurmountable difficulties. These Afrofuturist Parable novels render a disintegrating US society in the 2020s-2090s, which is torn by internal and external chaos: it shows visible signs of pandemonium involving the crisis of individual, communal, and ecological survival. This ecocritical reading seeks to explore how Butler’s novels make up the fictional tapestry of an evolving human risk narrative whose anthropogenic effects on the planet might threaten an “ecological holocaust” (Charles Brown) unless fundamental green changes spur radically alternative modes of thinking and living. Throughout this paper, I am interested in how Butler’s texts address and construct the interaction of the human and the non-human world to create a storyworld in which distinct characters operate not only according to the logic of the narrative in their local places and (semi)private/communal spaces, but also as distinct configurations of the Anthropocene, that is, as agents of a larger story of humans.},\n\tnumber = {2},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tjournal = {Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies (HJEAS)},\n\tpublisher = {Centre for Arts, Humanities and Sciences (CAHS), acting on behalf of the University of Debrecen CAHS},\n\tauthor = {Federmayer, Éva},\n\tyear = {2017},\n\tpages = {347--370},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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\n \n 2016\n \n \n (1)\n \n \n

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\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n Troubling Ecology: Wangechi Mutu, Octavia Butler, and Black Feminist Interventions in Environmentalism.\n \n \n \n \n\n\n \n Frazier, C. M.\n\n\n \n\n\n\n Critical Ethnic Studies, 2(1): 40–72. 2016.\n \n\n\n\n
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@article{frazier_troubling_2016,\n\ttitle = {Troubling {Ecology}: {Wangechi} {Mutu}, {Octavia} {Butler}, and {Black} {Feminist} {Interventions} in {Environmentalism}},\n\tvolume = {2},\n\tissn = {2373-5031},\n\tshorttitle = {Troubling {Ecology}},\n\turl = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/jcritethnstud.2.1.0040},\n\tdoi = {10.5749/jcritethnstud.2.1.0040},\n\tnumber = {1},\n\turldate = {2026-07-24},\n\tjournal = {Critical Ethnic Studies},\n\tpublisher = {University of Minnesota Press},\n\tauthor = {Frazier, Chelsea M.},\n\tyear = {2016},\n\tpages = {40--72},\n}\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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