Yesterday's Tomorrows : On Utopia and Dystopia

2012 was a year of financial crises and ecological disasters, of endings and forebodings. The world did not end on December 21st as the Mayan calendar predicted, but became the stage for new beginnings, utopian communities, protest groups and solidarity movements. The essays in this book form an intertextual space for negotiating meaningful facts and fictions with an aim to understanding the present. Discussions focus on utopia and dystopia from literature and film, not only within the framework of science fiction but also critical theory, gender politics and social sciences.The authors of these essays are international academics whose interest lies in utopian studies and who attended the 13th International Conference of Utopian Studies, "The Shape of Things to Come", held in Tarragona, Spain, in 2012.