The Tensions Between Utopic and Dystopic Constructions - A lecture by Natasha Wheat and Performance by the Sprockettes - January 8th

Utopia: title of a book by Sir Thomas More, Sir Thomas (Saint Thomas More), 1478–1535, English statesman and author of Utopia, celebrated as a martyr in the Roman Catholic Church. The work pictures an ideal state where all is ordered for the best for humanity as a whole and where the evils of society, such as poverty and misery, have been eliminated. The popularity of the book has given the generic name Utopia to all concepts of ideal states. The description of a utopia enables an author not only to set down criticisms of evils in the contemporary social scene but also to outline vast and revolutionary reforms without the necessity of describing how they will be effected. Thus, the influence of utopian writings has generally been inspirational rather than practical.

What is in your Utopian world?

Endale: Peace.

Jamond: Smile . Funny. Crazy. Pretty hair.

Zach: I like painting good pictures. I like the way I do pictures. I like to make it look nice.

Brian: Really, that's what you want to talk to me about? Is this the list? Closed cycle sustainability, universal/physical/neurological design, healthy democracy, gender abolition, low calorie nachos.

David: singing! Amanda in a duet. You look fabulous in utopia. Fabulous like Sandy.

Chanel: I've never been there. I'd like to go to India.