MIT Press Reactionary Worldbuilding: From Speculative Imagination to Political Practice

The first in-depth study of the dark side of worldbuilding, exploring the connection between speculative imagination and political practice. Speculative imagination brings to life an array of possible worlds that differ in crucial ways from the one governed by shared assumptions of the “normal,” “real,” or “inevitable.” This act of speculation—known as worldbuilding—has become undeniably resurgent in our times of multiple crises. Worldbuilding has long been associated with progressivist impulses, yet this book examines how worldbuilding has also been conducive to a diametrically opposite set of ideologies and politics, including apocalyptic re-enactments, alternative histories, and conspiracy theories. Reactionary Worldbuilding, edited by Anindita Banerjee, Sherryl Vint, David Higgins, and Jordan Carroll, analyzes how interrogating these reactionary modes can open up new ways of imagining value and belonging, justice and what is natural, history and its lessons, and the future and pathways to it. Combining theoretical and analytical perspectives with site-specific knowledge of various periods and regions around the world, from interwar Germany to Soviet Central Asia, post-independence India to contemporary South Korea, this volume traces the durable and persuasive appeal of reactionary worldbuilding far beyond the boundaries of the current moment. The speculative arts of reactionary worldbuilding cannot be dismissed as mere excesses of extremist fantasy; instead, this collection demonstrates that they can serve as crucial foundations for making sense of the self and the world and shows why it is urgent that we critique their power.