Mayer, Ruth (2000):
""Africa As an Alien Future": The Middle Passage, Afrofuturism, and Postcolonial Waterworlds." Time and the African-American Experience. Special issue of Amerikastudien / American Studies 45.4: 555-566.
Journal Article
Abstract

This paper investigates recent revisionist representations of the Middle Passage, enacted in the visual arts, literature, and pop music. Most of the texts I explore can be subsumed under the heading 'Afrofuturism,' an artistic and theoretical movement which has become a vital part of contemporary black diasporic (pop) culture. Afrofuturist artists turn to black history in order to recreate it in a markedly fantastic mode. Mixing up the imagery of the Middle Passage with contemporary experiences of displacement, migration, and alienation, they turn the project of recuperating the past into a futuristic venture.