In March 2025, I moderated this panel at SXSW — a conversation with three practitioners whose work keeps proving that Black women have been doing futures work all along.
Panelists:
- Lauren Williams (University of Michigan) — researcher and strategist examining the politics of imagination and the futures of Black civic life
- Dr. Shamika Klassen (Google) — technowomanist whose work roots technological design and advancement in the lived wisdom of Black women
- Carmela Wilkins (Feeding Us For Us) — speculative designer whose project Strange Fruit Market exposes how corporate power shapes food access in marginalized communities — a dynamic Butler mapped in Parable of the Sower decades ago
We worked through technowomanism, food sovereignty, histo-futurism, and what Octavia Butler was actually doing when she wrote about societal collapse: not prophesying, but observing, pattern-matching, and asking what if? The room was full. The energy was electric. The recording is below.
Session held March 2025, Austin Marriott Downtown, Austin TX. · View on SXSW Schedule
Video
