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Settlers have only one future: Jess Maginity, Prophesy and Propaganda: Rational and Relational Epistemologies in Right-Wing and Anishinaabe Science Fiction, PhD dissertation, University of Delaware, 2026

17Sep26

Abstract: Whether they want to be or not, science fiction writers act as social theorists. By juxtaposing two diametrically opposed traditions of science fiction, major works of right-wing sf and major works of Anishinaabeg sf, this dissertation argues that how we come to know what we know determines the kinds of futures we are capable of imagining. While Indigenous futurist novels model the importance of navigating multiple perspectives, right-wing novels model the importance of doubling down on a supposed truth. In each of the Indigenous novels that I study, relationships are the key to meaningful knowledge and a desirable future. In each of the right-wing novels that I study, a privileged discourse is the source of valuable knowledge and the guide for survival. This dissertation shows that an epistemological framework that depends on a set of rules to provide infallible truth is much more amenable to justifying subjugation and genocide than one which accepts a reality complicated enough to accommodate diverging interpretations. In a very real way, the difference between these two sets of texts is simply that one demands the future and the other demands a future.


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