Planning to survive: imagining the world catastrophe in science fiction

Titolo Rivista CRIOS
Autori/Curatori Luca Gaeta
Anno di pubblicazione 2016 Fascicolo 2016/12 Lingua Inglese
Numero pagine 14 P. 7-20 Dimensione file 1597 KB
DOI 10.3280/CRIOS2016-012002
Il DOI è il codice a barre della proprietà intellettuale: per saperne di più clicca qui

Qui sotto puoi vedere in anteprima la prima pagina di questo articolo.

Se questo articolo ti interessa, lo puoi acquistare (e scaricare in formato pdf) seguendo le facili indicazioni per acquistare il download credit. Acquista Download Credits per scaricare questo Articolo in formato PDF

Anteprima articolo

FrancoAngeli è membro della Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA)associazione indipendente e non profit per facilitare (attraverso i servizi tecnologici implementati da CrossRef.org) l’accesso degli studiosi ai contenuti digitali nelle pubblicazioni professionali e scientifiche

The paper aims at reviewing the main strategies for surviving a world catastrophe in science fiction. The underlying assumption is that science fiction can provide insight into unspoken social attitudes towards global risks as well as towards the effectiveness of disaster planning. The review covers a broad selection of fiction published in the US and UK since the end of WW2, featuring three types of human-caused world catastrophes: nuclear, biological and environmental. The results highlight that the imagination of what is helpful to survive the apocalypse has evolved towards patterns of individual actions instead of governmental or collective actions and towards the ability to face unexpected events rather than planning ahead. Such imagination can be approximated to underlying feelings as regards planning in the British and North American society at least, although the extent to which fiction reflects actual values and beliefs is open to dispute

  1. Agamben G. (2005). State of Exception. Chicago: University Press.
  2. Aldiss B.W. (1964). Greybeard. London: Faber & Faber.
  3. Aldiss B.W. (1965). Earthworks. London: Faber & Faber.
  4. Atwood M. (1985). The Handmaid’s Tale. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart.
  5. Ballard J. (1964). The Burning World. New York: Berkley.
  6. Beck U. (1992). The Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage.
  7. Beck U. (1999). World Risk Society. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.
  8. Berger J. (1999). After the End: Representations of Post-Apocalypse. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
  9. Bostrom N., Cirkovic M.M. (2008). Introduction. In: Id., Global Catastrophic Risks. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Boyer P. (1994). By the Bomb’s Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
  10. Brin D. (1985). The Postman. New York: Bantam Books.
  11. Broderick M. (1993). Surviving Armageddon: Beyond the Imagination of Disaster. Science Fiction Studies, 20: 362−382.
  12. Brunner J. (1972). The Sheep Look up. New York: Harper & Row.
  13. Bryant P. (1958). Two Hours to Doom. London: Boardman.
  14. Buell F. (2003). From Apocalypse to Way of Life: Environmental Crisis in the American Century.
  15. London: Routledge.
  16. Carson R. (1962). Silent Spring. London: Hamish Hamilton.
  17. Christensen K.S. (1985), Coping with Uncertainty in Planning. Journal of the American Planning Association, 51: 63-73. DOI: 10.1080/0194436850897680
  18. Christopher G.W., Cieslak T.J., Pavlin J.A. and Eitzen E.M. (1999). Biological Warfare: A Historical Perspective. In: Lederberg J., editor, Biological Weapons: Limiting the Threat, Cambridge, Harvard University Press.
  19. Clarke L. (1999). Mission Improbable: Using Fantasy Documents to Tame Disasters. Chicago: University Press.
  20. Dean M. (1999). Governmentality: Power and Rule in Modern Society. London: Sage.
  21. Dick P.H. (1964). The Penultimate Truth. New York: Belmont Books.
  22. Douglas M., Wildavsky A.B. (1982). Risk and Culture: An Essay on the Selection of Technological and Environmental Dangers. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  23. Forester J., Laws D. (2015). Conflict, Improvisation, Governance: Street Level Practices for Urban Democracy. New York and London: Routledge.
  24. Forman J. (1984). Doomsday Plus Twelve. New York: Scribner.
  25. Frank P. (1946). Mr Adam. Philadelphia: Lippincot.
  26. Frank P. (1959). Alas, Babylon. London: Constable.
  27. Friedmann J. (1973). Retracking America: A Theory of Transactive Planning. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press.
  28. Galbraith J.K. (1958). The Affluent Society. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
  29. Galouye D. (1961). Dark Universe. New York: Bantam Books.
  30. Garrison D. (2006). Bracing for Armageddon: Why Civil Defense Never Worked. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  31. Gary R.W., Chevreau F.-R. (2006). Planning to Improvise: The Importance of Creativity and Flexibility in Crisis Response. International Journal of Emergency Management, 3: 66-72. DOI: 10.1504/IJEM.2006.01028
  32. Gibson W. (1984). Neuromancer. London: Gollancz.
  33. Gunder M. (2008). Ideologies of Certainty in a Risky Reality: Beyond the Hauntology of Planning. Planning Theory, 7: 186-206. DOI: 10.1177/147309520809043
  34. Harrison C. (1981). The Quiet Earth. Auckland: Hodder & Stoughton.
  35. Heine W. (1976). The Last Canadian. London: Hale.
  36. Heinlein R. (1964). Farnham’s Freehold. New York: Putnam.
  37. Herbert F. (1982). The White Plague. London: Gollancz.
  38. Jacobs R.A. (2010). The Dragon's Tail: Americans Face the Atomic Age. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.
  39. Jameson F. (2005). Archaeologies of the Future: The Desire Called Utopia and Other Science Fictions. London and New York: Verso.
  40. Keith Mano D. (1973). The Bridge. New York: Doubleday. Kendra J.M., Wachtendorf T. (2007). Improvisation, Creativity, and the Art of Emergency Management. In: Durmaz H., Sevinc B., Yala A.S. and Ekici S., editors, Understanding and Responding to Terrorism. Nieuwe Hemweg: IOS Press.
  41. Ketterer D. (1974). New Worlds for Old: The Apocalyptic Imagination, Science Fiction, and the American Literature. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
  42. King S. (1978). The Stand. New York: Doubleday.
  43. Lawrence L. (1985). Children of the Dust. London: Bodley Head.
  44. Lewis D., Rodgers D. and Woolcock M. (2008). The Fiction of Development: Literary Representation as a Source of Authoritative Knowledge. Journal of Development Studies, 44: 198-216. DOI: 10.1080/0022038070178982
  45. Lytle M.H. (2007). The Gentle Subversive. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, and the Rise of the Environmental Movement. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  46. Matheson R. (1954). I Am Legend. New York: Gold Medal.
  47. McCarthy C. (2006). The Road. New York: Random House.
  48. Merril J. (1950). Shadow on the Earth. New York: Doubleday.
  49. Meyrowitz J. (1985). No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behaviour. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Miller W.M. Jr. (1965). Canticle for Leibowitz. New York: Bantam Books.
  50. Moore W. (1947). Greener Than You Think. New York: William Sloane.
  51. Niven L., Pournelle J. and Flynn M. (1993). Fallen Angels. London: Pan. NSRB - National Security Resources Board (1950).
  52. Survival Under Atomic Attack. Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office.
  53. Oakes G. (1994). Imaginary War: Civil Defense and American Cold War Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  54. Paik P.Y. (2010). From Utopia to Apocalypse: Science Fiction and the Politics of Catastrophe. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
  55. Parrinder P. (1995). Shadows of the Future: H.G. Wells, Science Fiction and Prophecy. Liverpool: University Press.
  56. Rose K.D. (2001). One Nation Underground: The Fallout Shelter in American Culture. New York: New York University Press.
  57. Roshwald M. (1959). Level 7. New York: New American Library.
  58. Sanford S., Polzer J. and McDonough P. (2016). Preparedness as a Technology of (In)security: Pandemic Influenza Planning and the Global Biopolitics of Emerging Infectious Disease. Social Theory & Health, 14: 18-43. DOI: 10.1057/sth.2015.
  59. Schlosser E. (2013). Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety. New York: Penguin Press.
  60. Shapiro J.F. (2002). Atomic Bomb Cinema: The Apocalyptic Imagination on Film. London: Routledge.
  61. Sontag S. (1967). The Imagination of Disaster. In: Against Interpretation, and Other Essays. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode.
  62. Tucker W. (1952). The Long Loud Silence. New York: Rinehart.
  63. Weart S.R. (2012). The Rise of Nuclear Fear. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  64. Wylie P. (1954). Tomorrow! New York: Henry Holt.
  65. Wylie P. (1963). Triumph. New York: Doubleday.
  66. Wylie P. (1973). The End of the Dream. New York: Daw Books.
  67. Wyndham J. (1951). The Day of Triffids. London: Michael Joseph.
  68. Wyndham J. (1955). The Chrysalids. London: Michael Joseph.

Luca Gaeta, Planning to survive: imagining the world catastrophe in science fiction in "CRIOS" 12/2016, pp 7-20, DOI: 10.3280/CRIOS2016-012002