Ytasha L. Womack is a thought architect… a future manifestor. Real time, that translates to filmmaker, producer and author. She is the auteur behind Raylan 2212, a sci fi/multimedia series. It’s interesting because Chicago is the capital of structural African power in America. Haitian immigrant Jean Baptiste Point du Sable founded
Ytasha L. Womack is a filmmaker, futurist and the author of Post Black: How a New Generation is Redefining African American Identity and the coeditor of Beats Rhymes and Life: What We Love and Hate About Hip Hop. She is also the creator of the Rayla 2212 Sci-Fi/multimedia series and author of 2212: Book of Rayla. She lives in Chicago.
With the historic success of Black Panther and her groundbreaking academic work with Black Panther with the publication of her book – Afro-futurism: The Work of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy and Culture – her work serves as WEB Dubois treaty at the inception of the 20th Century, The Souls of Black Folks. We, as a people, are at the beginning of power as a global international African arts movement, we are at the beginning of a new expression of humanity. Ytasha Womack’s work is the blueprint. Here is our exchange, a permanent fixture, goal post, outside the constraints of time as our souls and ancestors are timeless:
It’s interesting -I have often thought of principals as peace and as technology because of what they enable the human spirit to its highest form. I recently read of language being the first and most fundamental technology. So, it was really interesting to see your identification of “race” as a technology. Can you talk some more about that – and how that ‘technology’ affects these United States of America as well as the global culture?
Race as a technology is a recognized aspect of Afrofuturism. We all know that race was created and yet our society maintains these categories as existential states of permanent existence. Race or the notion of being black or white specifically was created to justify the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The caste system that resulted was encoded through law and violence. People in our society have fought very vigilantly to change the system and recognize our shared humanity but the idea of separation continues to exist.
How race functions varies from country to country and sometimes is defined by who colonized the nation centuries ago, the nature of enslavement or colonization, and the reconciliations, if any that followed. Race is closely related to access, and as access for people changes, race as we discuss it changes as well. Race, like many identities, including gender, religion, etc, is more fluid than we know. This fluidity is attributed to the fact that it was created in the context of limitation and individuals are constantly negotiating their relationship to it.
Technologies are created to serve a need or function and discussing race in that was is a reminder that it is, in fact, a creation.
I graduated from Clark Atlanta University and went to Columbia College Chicago for grad school.
You wrote Afro Futurism- the world of Black Sci Fi and Fantasy in 2013, When you were a student at Clark Atlanta and began to explore these tenants, did you imagine they would have such universal appeal? With Octavia Butler, Janelle Monae, Renee Cox there was already the blueprint and body of work that was “Afro Futurism” but it was not until your book AfroFuturism, I think, that there was a cogent embodiment of those concepts in a literary treatise (I might be incorrect) – or, at least one which has caught on through the mainstream and embodied the mores of “popular culture”.
The book did help synergize people who were interested in Afrofuturism but weren’t familiar with the term. I’ve always seen Afrofuturism as universal so I’m not completely surprised by people’s enthusiasm about it. I just feel that naming a subject is empowering and helps point people to works and histories that remind them they aren’t alone in their contemplations. My book isn’t the first writing on the subject. There were quite a few essays in academia. However my book is a leading primer that I wrote largely to create bridges for people who approached Afrofuturism in a range of ways but, for the most part, didn’t know they were Afrofuturists or that such a thing had a body of work behind it.
Black Panther Trailer spot featured an image of your book at 3:31 in the film, Black Panther Trailer BREAKDOWN – Music Explained & Easter Eggs You Missed I see that movie and its potential as having the ability to shift the culture from Alt-wrong (Alt right) back to Alt-cool (Alt left). Are you a furturist? Can you create the future? Are you a super nerd? Have you ever flown? Are their elements of telepathy or clairvoyance that inform you in your work? Do you have any, actual, super powers 😉
Someone once told me that my super power was the belief in possibility. I thought that was a pretty wack super power at the time. However, now I think there’s a virtue in optimism. To quote Rev. Jesse Jackson, you can’t move forward with cynicism. As for the future, people collectively create futures every day through their thinking and actions. Many of us are just not cognizant of how our thought and actions (or lack of) shape the world.
As a film maker, you are literally, a visionary. Your vision and the manifestation of that vision creates realities in other folks minds. What sort of projects are you currently working on. Do any agendas, social, spiritual, visionary, color you and your work now or in the next decade?
As human’s we’re hard-wired to engage in stories. I like telling stories that remind us of our own humanity, resilience, sense of purpose, and the value of community.I like sharing histories and present actions that reflect that as well.
What is imagination? Is it a real space? A real place? Or is it a private hallucination between and individual and themselves? Are we, the children of slaves, kings and queens, the imagination, of our ancestors? Or, is time a linear experience that is kept on Western time? Is there a collective experience of “imagination” that informs your work?
The imagination is as real as the dreamer wants it to be. I think Rasheedah Phillips work in Black Quantum Futurism is really interesting because it looks at African traditional and diasporic perspectives on time as it relates to quantum physics. Essentially, her work is a reminder that our current take on linear time is a perspective we’ve all been conditioned to work within. Our current perspective on time as linear is like looking at the ruler as the object it measures.
Politically and socially, America is in a position with KKK and Alt Right and relics of the 80’s setting a tone a lot of us did not foresee for the 21st century. Is there a silver lining? Will America find its true center or are the social and cultural battles going to stay with us Americans until… until? What does futurist Ytasha Womack see now (in 2017) and in the distant future 2317 a.d.). What will our children say of us in the world to come?
People can create whatever they want to create if they believe they can do so. I think it would be great for more people to give thought to the kind of world they would like to see and to really envision what that world looks and feels like. Personally, I like creating spaces that value humanity. Perhaps we should give more thought to thinking about valuing humanity and what that means. Many people put energy into what they don’t want instead of into what they do want.
They put a lot of energy into fear and frustrations. Having a vision and taking steps to bring it about is important.
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Photos courtesy of the author.