Il est difficile de ne pas concevoir l’utopie du côté de la rupture : division spatiale originelle, tension temporelle, désaccord critique. Pourtant les théories et attaques des anti-utopistes voient dans l’utopie un monde illusoire voire inutile, clos, signant la fin des temps et potentiellement dangereux pour l’humanité. Et si l’utopie n’était pas le programme de la société meilleure à réaliser, mais bien au contraire une pratique transgressive, une apparition de discontinuité dans notre « ici et maintenant », un excès qui vient doubler le réel plutôt qu’un possible à réaliser dans le futur ?Iain M. Banks est un auteur de science-fiction contemporain original et audacieux, qui, conscient des dangers inhérents à l’utopie, a su jouer avec ces limites pour proposer une société utopique totalement inédite : cette utopie s’appelle la Culture. Comment réinvestir singulièrement l’utopie ? Comment la science-fiction – et plus précisément le genre du space-opéra – permet-elle de mettre en scène des problématiques politiques dignes d’un intérêt philosophique ?Iain M. Banks imagine une utopie tout entière tournée vers la rencontre, la proximité, la nouveauté. Subvertissant les traditions utopique et science-fictionnelle, le Cycle de la Culture est traversé par l’altérité et le conflit. Ces deux caractéristiques sont les fils directeurs de cette thèse qui vise à reconceptualiser l’utopie dans une perspective philosophique, politique et littéraire, en travaillant les représentations du discours utopique au sein du laboratoire science fictionnel.Ce discours prend ici trois formes : dystopie, hétérotopie, (e)utopie. Ensemble, elles dessinent une « culture utopique radicale ». / It is difficult not to conceive utopia as a rupture: through original spatial division, temporal tension, critical discordance. Yet, theories and attacks from anti-utopians consider utopia as an illusory world, even useless, enclosed, marking the end of times and potentially dangerous for humanity. What if utopia was not the programme of a better society to realize,but instead a transgressive practice, an apparition of discontinuity in our « now and here », an excess which overtakes reality rather than a possible that has yet to be realized in the future? Iain M. Banks is a contemporary, original and audacious science-fiction author, who,aware of the inherent dangers of utopia, has known how to challenge these limits in order to provide a completely unique utopian society: this utopia is called the Culture. How to critically reinvest utopia? How can science fiction – and more precisely the genre of space-opera – depict political issues, worthy of philosophical enquiry? Iain M. Banks imagines a space for utopia, entirely oriented towards encounter,proximity, and novelty. Subverting science-fictional and utopian traditions, notions of alterity and conflict span the Culture Cycle. These two characteristics are the guiding principles of this dissertation, which aims at reconceptualizing utopia through a philosophical, political and literary perspective, by way of analysing the representations of utopian discourses within the science-fictional laboratory. These discourses take three shapes: dystopia, heterotopia, (e)utopia. Together, they outline a “radical utopian culture”.

My work is a tribute to the disintegration of built environments, and the chaos and disturbance that it brings into the idea of what a city should look like. An ode to the ruins that are witnesses to destructive social and economic systems and that tell the stories of the life that once inhabited them. A comment and critique on humanities way of ruining everything: world that we live in and our self; a destructive behaviour that we refuse to admit we have, and desperately try to hide. We polish the façades and fake our appearance in order to keep the illusion. I am discussing the concept of ruin romanticism, comparing the garden ruins of the eighteenth century to the urban exploration of abandoned places of modern society, the fascination for what once was, but are no more and the different feelings these places might arouse. I describe how I through experiments with dying, deconstructed screen printing and distressing, manipulate fabrics to create an illusion of brick walls. And how I through experiments with display, sound and light explore solutions for creating the dystopic atmosphere of abandoned places in a textile installation. My biggest inspiration is the inevitable downfallof the urban landscape and I am romanticising the imperfections and the flaws. I take what is understood as ugly by the rules of aesthetics, make it beautiful, and put it on a pedestal.

Works of feminist utopian literature project longing for and predict political change while confronting current social inequities. Often, they effectively interrogate Western models of citizenship and the institutions which reify them, suggesting alternate models. Here, I define Western citizenship as determined by the maintenance of the nation-state through gendered social roles that restrict women to the private sphere and men to the public. This thesis asserts that feminist utopian literature, like politically conscious music, art, and other forms of feminist praxis, is a politically necessary component of feminist consciousness because it facilitates much-needed visions of a more equitable future for all citizens. Here, patriarchy, separatism, socialism, and radical democracy, as well as attendant difficulties in implementation and ramifications for women, will be considered through the following works: Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Herland, Sally Miller Gearhart’s The Wanderground, Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Dispossessed, Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, and Starhawk’s The Fifth Sacred Thing. The thesis also comments on some of the narrative devices and themes of works discussed, such as nonlinear structure, avoidance of closure, altered states of consciousness, and exile. Analysis of these works relies in part on a growing body of speculative fiction criticism while also considering feminist theories of difference and vision. The thesis concludes with recommendations for utilizing feminist utopian literature as a part of feminist pedagogy.

Cette étude analyse le discours totalitaire à travers le prisme du personnage du Grand Inquisiteur dans quatre romans dystopiques : "Le Zéro et l’infini" d’Arthur Koestler, "1984" de George Orwell, "La Zone du Dehors" d’Alain Damasio et "2084" de Boualem Sansal. Il s’agira non seulement de comprendre la structure du discours totalitaire mais également la façon dont il interagit dans l’univers dystopique et avec les autres personnages. La méthode de recherche aborde ces questions de façon pluridisciplinaire afin de mieux analyser les aspects linguistiques, historiques et philosophiques au sein de la littérature dystopique. La thèse se découpe en trois grandes parties, elles-mêmes divisées en trois chapitres. Il s’agit d’étudier en premier lieu la parole hérétique qui s’oppose au dogme totalitaire, pour ensuite comprendre la manière dont le discours du Grand Inquisiteur impose son joug sur chaque individu. Enfin, la recherche aborde la dimension salvatrice de chacune des œuvres du corpus. A travers elles, les auteurs ne souhaitent pas uniquement tendre un miroir désespérant du monde mais aussi ouvrir des possibilités pour faire face aux dérives totalitaires qui peuvent être engendrée / This research analyses totalitarian’s speech from the Grand Inquisitor in four dystopia’s books: "Darkness at Noon" from Arthur Koestler, "1984" from George Orwell, "La Zone du Dehors" from Alain Damasio and "2084" from Boualem Sansal. This work studies the structure of the totalitarian’s speech and how he interacts with dystopia’s universe and their characters. Questioning will be treated through dystopia’s literature and from linguistical, historical and philosophical viewpoints. Thesis is divided in three parts, each one divided in three chapters. First part analyses heretic’s speech in opposition to totalitarian’s dogma. Second part studies how the Grand Inquisitor dominates everyone in the dystopia’s society. In fine, third part tries to find the saving dimension in corpus. In fact, writers don’t want to show only a dark future. Their books are maybe a message to fight against totalitarian’s excesses.

This dissertation explores the ways that women authors of science fiction have altered conventions of utopia and science fiction in order to revise conceptions of gender, sexuality, the body, and the environment. I examine several twentieth-century feminist critical dystopias that continue to betray genre and form, and to shape the science fiction being written at this moment. Each of the works demonstrates particular elements that facilitate its revisionary power: challenging and deconstructing sex/gender systems, blending utopian and dystopian conventions, and engaging in temporal play. By doing so they accomplish a range of tasks: disrupting generic and historical conventions, blending genres, redefining utopia, and making connections with present realities in order to make a case for social change, particularly for female and queer subjects. Though many of the texts are considered canonical by sf standards, and have been widely praised and critiqued in academic publications, each one continues its project of resistance in the light of the genre and of ever-evolving theories of gender, sexuality, race, and identity. As a scholar of gender and queer theory, I find within sf an extraordinary realm of potential for those willing to challenge norms and imagine new possibilities. In their rejection of system and form, the authors render impure the genre of science fiction, providing a new space in which utopian ideals can become literary and cultural resistance.

Today it is common to state that we are living in an information overloaded society. But there are many different definitions of what can be said to constitute Information Overload and there is a lack of substantial research on the subject. Conclusions in the available literature on Information Overload are often drawn on anecdotal evidence and carries a dramatized picture of the causes and effects of the phenomenon. With the tools of discursive analysis this two years master’s thesis explores how the phenomenon Information Overload is portrayed in six popular science books that deals with the subject: Alvin Toffler (1970) Future Shock, Orrin Klapp (1986) Overload and Boredom, Richard Wurman (1989) Information Anixety, Andrew Keen (2007) The cult of the amateur, Maggie Jackson (2008), Distracted and Nicholas Carr (2010) The Shallows. The result of the analysis shows that there is a common discourse of how the subject of Information Overload is represented, which stretches in and between the books intertextually. In this study that discourse is called the dystopian discourse of Information Overload. It is structured by a unified use of narratives, concepts, themes, metaphors and statements and by its separation from the opposite utopian discourse of Information Overload. In the final discussion the results of the analysis are compared to postmodern theory, a problematisation of the concept of distraction and to the Swedish government’s 2012 investigation of reading habits of young people in the country. The conclusion of the study is that the two binary discourses discovered in the analysis – the dystopian and the utopian – should be avoided in the debate and research on Information Overload. Instead the discussion should be influenced by pluralism, complexity and awareness.

This thesis is an attempt to understand the relations between architecture and ideology in literary spaces in the context of Dystopias. It will pursue a definition of the relation between architecture and ideology to understand how the paradigmatic changes affect literary form of architecture to pose revolutionary thought(s). Literature often presents a dystopia or utopia to criticise its own written time, and literary text itself, is both a collection and a pressed version of that time. That is why to examine the ideologies and ideological changes in the period from 1920 to 1950, literary text and constructed spaces in dystopias are used as apparatus to form both the dominant ideology with its negative points and the revolutionary one as a space of resistance. Main discussion will be based on literary spaces in three dystopias / We written by Russian novelist Yevgeny Zamyatin, Brave New World written by Aldous Huxley and Nineteen Eighty Four written by George Orwell. These cases will be used to open the claim that dominant ideology determines the spatial distances of revolutionary thoughts and architecture, and appear as both cause and result of a materialisation of thoughts, thereby forming a dialectic representation of that ideology. Four main items will form the thesis / architecture, ideology, literary spaces (textual spaces) and trilogy of utopia/dystopia/heterotopias.

Costa Rica is a small country located in Central America, characterized by having one of the most stable democracies in Latin America. Costa Rica was the first country in the world to officially abolish its armed forces (1949), following the Civil War in 1948. From the time of its foundation as a Republic, Costa Rica has been defined in terms of homogeneity and socio-economic equality. These two features have been recognized as the main elements of the country's national identity, and the reason for Costa Ricans to be perceived as peaceful and happy individuals. This research utilizes the methodological lens of Performance Studies to analyze these iconic elements of Costa Rican national identity and to challenge the view of Costa Rica as a paradise. Even though the international community continues defining this country in the same manner in which it was defined during the second part of the nineteen century, the reality is that during the last three decades this nation has changed so much that the same definition is not adequate anymore. Street violence in the country has become a threat to citizens of all socio-economic classes, taking away their peace and happiness. I analyze this development and the response by the citizens in an attempt to show that Costa Rica is facing an internal conflict that could have devastating on its society. Many social movements have formed during the last decade to try to bring Costa Rica back to the nation it was at the beginning of the twentieth century. The most important characteristic of these movements is that they try to unmask the country showing that it is not peaceful in an attempt to recover the peace they believed characterized the Costa Rica of their ancestors.

The early twentieth century saw the beginning of modern environmentalism. Intellectuals dreamed up solutions to the world’s problems and hoped for a better future being made possible by advances in science and technology. However, Aldous Huxley produced Brave New World which, as this essay argues, mocks the enthusiasm of his intellectual peers. The dystopian novel depicts a future in which technology dehumanizes the population, and uses a great deal of animal imagery to make this point. This essay analyses the use of animal imagery from an ecocritical perspective arguing that the “pathetic fallacy” is reversed. By examining the use of biotechnology and central planning in the novel, and applying the ecocritical perspective that humanity and nature are part of a whole, this essay argues that society resembles a farm for human animals, which is partly expressed by Huxley’s use of the image of a bee colony. The argument is presented that Huxley satirizes his environmentally concerned peers by depicting a totalitarian state which, though unconcerned with environmental issues, echoes the eco-fascist methods proposed by the author’s friends and family.

Socialinė utopija yra stabiliausia žmonijos svajonė apie tobulą visuomenės būseną. Nematomu siūlu ji susieja tarpusavyje daugumą epochų ir savo šaknimis siekia tolimąją praeitį, atrasdama save žmonijos svajonėse apie „aukso amžių“. Būtent todėl kai kurie tyrinėtojai laiko socialinę utopiją vienu seniausių ir fundamentaliausių mitų. Utopijos esmės apmąstymams skirta daug filosofų, istorikų, sociologų darbų, tačiau iki šiol mokslinėje literatūroje neegzistuoja vieningo viešai pripažinto „utopijos“ sąvokos apibrėžimo. Dėl to diskusijos šiuo klausimu tebesitęsia. Kai kurie tyrinėtojai mano, kad apibrėžti utopijos apskritai yra neįmanoma. Nors mokslinėje literatūroje yra be galo įvairių „utopijos“ aiškinimo būdų, darbe yra bandoma skirtingus požiūrius subalansuoti, kad galima būtų išspręsti iškeltą tikslą – aptarti perėjimą nuo utopinių epochų į antiutopinę. Socialinė utopija, kaip visuomeninės minties reiškinys, savo raidoje išgyveno daug etapų. Pirmiausia – tai mitologinis etapas, kada visi pasaulio reiškiniai, išpasakojami pagal jų daromą įspūdį žmogaus vaizduotei, įgauna (mūsų akimis žiūrint) simbolinį, fantastinį bei sapnus primenantį pobūdį. Antrąjį etapą galima sąlygiškai apibrėžti kaip demitologizavimo, arba racionalizavimo etapą. Čia atsiranda teoriniai aiškinimai, kodėl idealioji būtis ir su ja siejamas žmonijos laimingas gyvenimas yra kitokia negu realus gyvenimas. Šiuo atveju realusis gyvenimas savaip „įstatomas“ į kitą, lyg ir neegzistuojantį pasaulį, tačiau turintį... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Social utopia is the steadiest dream of sustainable human consciousness of the perfect state of society. It is an invisible thread binds together many times and has its roots in the distant past, revealing itself in the human dreams about the "golden age". That's why some researchers call the social utopia one of the oldest and most fundamental myths. Social utopia as a phenomenon of public opinion in its development goes through a number of stages, firstly, that the mythological stage, when a person creates a fantastic, fairy picture of the world, which in general is an emerging property of consciousness. The second phase can be arbitrarily designated as the theoretical-rational. Here, the construction of a human happiness is based on theoretical reflection by a rational positing of ideal being in a different, non-existent world, having though the features of the real world. Third, the practical stage in which the utopian theories that can affect the world and transform it (for example, utopian socialism) are being tried to implement. Here also presents utopian desire to embody social and moral foundations into real practical life. The revival and the rise of utopian consciousness usually occur in times of great social and political upheavals. This research indicates that nutrient growth for utopia is the crisis, transitional stages in the development of society, so utopia is often a symptom of the crisis in the existing social order. Utopia accumulates and expresses... [to full text]