Diversity in Sci-Fi Book Club #2 – 08.12.21
Join our Science Fiction Book Club!
In this session we will be discussing the story “Anxiety Is The Dizziness Of Freedom” by Ted Chiang which has inspired Mirabelle Jones’ work “It’s Time We Talked” For their current exhibition at Catch “Digital Alchemy: Future Technology Products Inspired by Diverse Voices in Science Fiction”.
This book club focuses on works written by diverse Science-Fiction authors and seeks to expand the narrative of Science-Fiction literature and who creates it. The book club also seeks to use science fiction and literature to let us collectively imagine new worlds and new ways of using and developing technology.
Link for short story available online: https://onezero.medium.com/anxiety-is-the-dizziness-of-freedom-b5ab45cae2a5
ABOUT
“It’s Time We Talked” – The Quantum Communication Crystal features a pair of devices which allow the user to communicate with a version of themself from another quantum timeline. In other words, the crystal allows you to speak with another you—one who made different decisions. Always wondered what your life might’ve amounted to if you’d taken a different fork somewhere along the way? What might your life have been like if you’d studied science instead of art, or married your High School crush, or been born into a better or worse situation? The quantum communication crystal allows you to find out! The objects are based on the Plaga Interworld Signaling Mechanism prisms found in Ted Chiang’s short story “Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom” in which a group of addicts become addicted to speaking with their quantum selves.
Digital Alchemy: Future Technology Products Inspired by Diverse Voices in Science Fiction explores works of science fiction written by a diverse body of authors including women, LGBQTQAI* folx, and people of color to realize diverse futures through the creation of fictional technologies. Situated at the intersection of product design, speculative fiction, maker culture and intersectional data feminism, the artist selects devices and technologies mentioned within these works and realizes them as interactive product prototypes. The objects will be displayed, in both a physical and virtual exhibition, alongside documentation regarding the process of creating the object based on the fictional text. In this way, the project serves as an homage to the works of diverse voices in science fiction while also exploring the relationship between sci-fi and future technologies that are imbued with and directive of our culture.
Join us physically at Catch and experience the exhibition and work inspired by this story along with discussing the short story in an informal environment.
Online participation is also possible.
Registration required:
https://forms.gle/GyBjQqqzpyatS1Dw7
We follow Covid-19 Guidelines for physical participation