Speculative Play and Just Futurities

Speculative Play and Just Futurities establishes eight residencies per year, for three years, for a diverse group of emerging scholars and creators who are imagining new futures focused on social justice.

The residencies are open to all scholars and creators who have a track record of work focused on addressing social justice issues facing historically marginalized groups—including, but not limited to, Black, Latinx, Asian, Indigenous, and LGBTQ+ communities as well as Persons with Disabilities (ideally with an emphasis on recognizing intersectional identities and experiences within these communities).

Residents may include writers, game designers, poets, dramaturges, filmmakers, VR/AR storytellers, ludologists, critical theorists, and more—essentially individuals who are engaged in constructing (or creating frameworks for others to construct) alternative humanistic narratives that expand our understanding of what literature can be and the ways that it can help us imagine and enact just futures.   

Speculative Play and Just Futurities is a collaboration between the IUPUI Arts & Humanities Institute, the Center for Africana Studies and Culture, and the Ray Bradbury Center.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Mellon Foundation.