Speculative Architectures after Minoritarian Futurisms

Speculative Architectures after Minoritarian Futurisms is a work of architectural theory which understands architecture as a practice of speculation analogous to science fiction. While it might seem immediately obvious, especially given the discipline's legacy of fantastical invention and commitment to "the future," this book argues that this hypothetical conjunction offers a highly sophisticated critical perspective on the discipline, arguing that the only way to deal with the complex challenges of the present is through processes of speculation and ethical commitment to imagining futures evinced in minoritarian futurisms.

This book reads architecture from the perspective of the recent florescence of futurisms—from Afro-futurism to xeno-feminism—with an attention to how they produce a different image of architecture. In understanding architecture as speculative practice, the book also suggests understanding the architect by analogy to the author of science fiction. Learning from queer and feminist perspectives, this method of "science fictioning" refuses to take the terms now defining the discipline as totalising and immutable and investigates the unique subjectivities, positions, and responsibilities that might be imagined as the architect-to-come.

This book will be of interest to researchers and students of architectural theory, science fiction studies, design futures, and global futurisms.

Joel P.W. Letkemann (he/him) is an assistant professor of architecture at Aalborg University, in Denmark. After working as an architectural designer in Canada, Joel has taught architecture since 2014, and has published and exhibited in several venues across North America and Europe. With a broad interdisciplinary background from the humanities to computer science, Joel’s current research considers architectural speculation and conceptions of futurity, architectural education, architectural theory with a focus on sustainable community, and feminist and queer critical theory. Joel is actively involved in initiatives related to diversity and inclusion in architecture and recently co-edited Building+Breaking: Eight Conversations about Spatial Justice, published by the Danish Architectural Press in 2024.