I have been searching for years for a way to explore my intense interest in utopia/dystopia. I have considered the 'popular nonfiction' approach (à la The Lexus and the Olive Branch or The End of History and the Last Man only more future and less past oriented). I have considered attempting a science fiction novel of the alternate history/alternate future genre (a novel as a first project has, and continues to, strike me as excessively presumptuous, even for me). I have considered doing an interdisciplinary PhD and using the dissertation as the vehicle for this exploration (besides money and time, I also feel unsure that the restrictiveness of contemporary American academic culture would really match well with my interests).
In addition to these struggles with form and method, I have struggled with the problem of how to make this exploration less intrinsically "about me". I have done just enough study and reflection in psychology and religion to feel quite confident that engaging in a long, detailed conversation with myself about an ideal (positive or negative) future would have A LOT to say about me, but, unfortunately, not so much to say about such a future. Perhaps this last is true of all writing, but I think that it can certainly be a matter of degree, and as my interest in this project is an inherently social one, I have been trying to figure out how to wind up on the 'less about me' side of the scale.
Recently, a few things have converged that feel like a genuine ah-ha moment about how to move forward with this. The first is thanks to my book club (Don, Mitch, Dallas, Skip, and Terry.) Where we recently read
Cory Doctorow's new self-released compilation book
With a Little Help. (Extra thanks to Skip, who selected the book.) While there are many things that I both enjoyed and appreciated about the book and the methods employed in its production and distribution, the one that has most opened my mind to something personally relevant is the idea of allowing others to commission stories. The idea that I could seduce people into my project by letting the sow a 'brief' and reap a 'story' is phenomenal. The further idea that at some point in the future this could also morph into a revenue stream that might enable me to spend more and more of my time doing such things is so tantalizing it feels dirty! (...and probably is.)
Similarly, I have recently realized that I enjoy the free-form discussion or Q&A after I give a sermon much more than I enjoy the writing and delivery of the sermon itself. I don't think I could skip the writing and delivery part, it provides the foundation upon which the conversation occurs. But what I really enjoy about the interaction is listening to how people are working to either connect or disconnect from what I have put out there, and then to work myself to meet them on their terms and to speak to them in their language about the aspects that they care about. I think that the parallel with the idea of this site is that I am putting the Q&A before the research, writing, and delivery (in the form of a commission brief), this way the bulk of the project is spent in the mode of meeting the client (aka. co-conspirator) in their vision of ?topia. (It also occurs to me that one could construct, or interpret previous constructions as, ambigous-topias, perhaps ?topia is a symbol of such a vision.)
So look for the next post, which will provide some outline criteria for the blog's first slate of commissions...
