Can We Imagine Our Way to a Better Future? - New York
Event
This year, New America celebrates 20 years of creating and incubating the next big ideas that address some of the nation's and the world’s toughest problems. We are thinkers, researchers, problem-solvers, and storytellers, united by our goal to hold our nation to its highest ideals. We recognize the challenges presented by rapid technological and social change, and work to ensure that the solutions made possible by those changes lead to greater opportunity for all. As we reach forward toward the next 20 years of New America, we will strive to be an engine of American renewal, at home and abroad.
The future isn’t a fixed path along which we are helplessly propelled. We make the future together through choices small and large, minute and momentous, and stories are often the best way to explore how those choices affect people’s lives. Stories are certainly the best way for people to gain understanding of scientific and technological breakthroughs and trends, as well as to consider their impact on society.
That is why Future Tense covers how technology is portrayed in popular culture, and it’s also why we publish fiction alongside our ideas journalism. Indeed, we are proud to announce the publication this month of Future Tense Fiction: Stories of Tomorrow, our anthology featuring 14 speculative stories from such accomplished authors as Paolo Bacigalupi, Emily St. John Mandel, Annalee Newitz, Carmen Maria Machado, and others.
Please join us at the Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice for a conversation on the power of imagination and fiction to better inform our future. The discussion will feature award-winning authors Emily St. John Mandel, Mark Oshiro, and Ken Liu in conversation with Dan Grushkin and Torie Bosch on the power of storytelling, followed by a reception to celebrate the publication of Future Tense Fiction.
Follow the conversation online using #FutureTenseFiction and following @FutureTenseNow.
Moderator:
Torie Bosch, @thekibosch
Editor, Future Tense
Speakers:
Emily St. John Mandel, @EmilyMandel
Author of “Mr. Thursday”
Winner of the 2015 Arthur C. Clarke Award
Mark Oshiro, @MarkDoesStuff
Author of “No Me Dejas”
Winner of the 2019 Schneider Family Book Award for Teen Book
Ken Liu, @kyliu99
Author of “Thoughts and Prayers”
Winner of the 2015 Hugo Award for Best Novel
Daniel Grushkin, @Biodesigned
Founder and director of the Biodesign Challenge
Cofounder of Genspace