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‘’-Hey, we can run a space station, a station on the moon, and soon, a colony on Mars. That proves we're still a great, forward-looking, powerful nation, right?

 

-Yeah. Well, we're barely a nation at all anymore, but I'm glad we're still in space. We have to be going some place other than down the toilet’’

 

The global crises such as climate change, economic inequality, migration waves and finally the pandemic have escalated the emphasis on apocalyptic discourse in every sphere of life. Recently, we have been witnessing the space strolls of white western billionaires and even their attempts to establish colonies in space. Those who remain on Earth however, are offered alternatives such as the metaverse as an escape from physical reality. Is this space adventure a new product of the power display of the western rich, or is it a warning signal about the hopeless future of the world? Then we all know who will have the privilege of establishing a habitable universe in space when the Earth becomes uninhabitable. So, who can best teach these privileged people who migrate to another planet about the experience they could never acquire in the world; the unique experience of resettlement and integration? If we consider space travel in terms of building a life from scratch with unknown cultural, physical and social codes in search of a better future, this has already happened in the world we live in.

 

Berlin, with its queer utopia perception, is one of the cities that receives the most immigrants from many parts of the world, especially the Global South. So, does it meet the expectations of LGBTI* people like us, who migrated here with the desire to establish a safer future? If our destination is utopia, does this mean that the place we left is dystopia? Could diaspora be some kind of metaverse of our previous lives? While de facto migration gives us the metaphysical experience of being in two different places at the same time - whether mentally or physically - it is actually not located far from the channels where the science fiction genre extends. In this research, I aim to focus on the (performative) sci-fi potential of the migration by investigating the connection between the migration experience and space travel, in particular for queer immigrants.

 

Jameson argues science fiction future as a ‘critical’ exploration of our present conditions and their limits. With this research I aim to discover how our present conditions affect the ways we manifest on future, how it shapes our hopes depending on where we are localized with our neglected narratives, how we can exceed those limits and if speculative fiction could be the impetus on reclaiming our space in the present with its future oriented emancipatory potential. 

 

1. Utopia/Diaspora

 

In the first part of the research, I will be working with queer people in Berlin who migrated here in recent years. Through various workshop sessions, I aim to open a space for participants to imagine their own space journey and create a queer sci-fi utopia of their own. How would they construct this new place? What would they call the name of the spaceship they travel? Would they have an apartment in the coldest planet Uranus just like Preciado or would they discover a whole new, yet unknown planet? In reference to quantum superposition could migrants have a super power of being in two places at once? If we pass through the black holes, do we get to see our versions in a parallel universe where we never left our countries? What would be the force majeure of leaving the world and what would be the most important rule of the new planet to provide harmony among all the species? What would this planet offer to heal past traumas? What guideline they would write for the first people to settle in Space in order to deal with migration? It is to discover how we designate the future beyond Anthropocene from queer migrant perspectives on a fictional level but also how we position our expectations in diaspora. The participants will be free to write, draw or compose their narration according to the medium of their choice however I expect to have texts mostly in a letter form. The first part is planned to take place in Berlin in May 2022.

 

      2. Dystopia

 

Baccolini defines critical dystopias as "open-ended dystopias that maintain a utopian core at their center, a locus of hope that contributes to deconstructing and reconstructing alternatives’’but who has power and ability to reconstruct these alternatives? In order to eloborate non-european perspectives the second phase will take place(physically or digitally) in Turkey in June 2022 with LGBTQI* persons where the community is openly targeted by public authorities and many queer people are seeking ways to escape. 

 

In the second part of the research, we will explore how space travel is envisioned in an environment where the dystopian feeling is even more intense and try to amplify the utopian core. Similar method will be followed as in the previous part to convey new-world building. So we will explore how participants in Turkey speculate on future alternatives and designate their own queer utopia and maybe even write an open letter to Elon Musk who surprisingly collaborate with Mr.Erdogan on a space journey. 

 

        3. Anotherverse

Following the completion of the first two phases of the research, the materials collected from both fieldworks will be transformed into either a theater production or a written collective diary. This output will serve as a narrative of queer migrant futurism and projections.


Bibliography:

Baccolini, Raffaella. Future Females: The Next Generation.

Barad, Karen. Undoing the Future: Superposition is Not Being Here or There, It is to Be Indeterminately Here and There.

Butler, Octavia. Parable of the Sower.

Jameson, Fredric. The Political Unconscious.

Preciado, Paul B. An Apartment on Uranus.

The research project is supported by Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media within the program NEUSTART KULTUR.

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