The Process
Through a collective brainstorm, we imagined a future United States in 2040. We specifically envisioned an aspirational, fantastical future that was not constrained by realistic considerations of what may or may not be attainable. We came up with 9 themes that we populated with general characteristics that we collectively generated (see included photos for the full brainstorm outcome):
- Race: eradication of systemic racism, open acknowledgement of differences, diverse media representation, race relations, ethnic and indigenous studies taught in schools, no normalized racism, integrated schools
- Geography: bi-national cities, no visa restrictions, equal representation, community re-investment, asylum for political refugees
- Government: more proportional system, reversal of gerrymandering, full participation, compulsory civil service, demilitarization, rebalancing of rural/urban power
- Economics: universal basic income, mandated profit sharing, stricter regulation
- Participatory politics: really connected to formal political spaces, shared spaces between political parties
- Arts: yes!, more STEAM, democratized arts, art as activism, knowledge produced through arts
- News: community populated, grassroots, watched, user generated, free, immersive
- Healthcare: safe, free, universal, not overpriced, curious empowered doctors, open research, community based, local clinics, alternative medicine, preventive and holistic care
- Social justice: federally protected rights, archival system for hate crimes, strong networks, a shared value, rights of machines
- Tech: informational privacy rights, useful tech/not displacing people, free internet, artificial intelligence is more accessible
- Education: lower cost, basic tech literacy, useful/purposeful, based in many places, compensation for educators
- Environment: clean energy, integration of research groups
Once we completed the brainstorm, each participant embarked on writing their own personal or fictional response to the brainstorm.
Story Writing Instructions
Please write with these prompts in mind. Plan to spend a maximum of one hour on this! You may choose to remain anonymous if you prefer:
Situate yourself and the reason you are writing this and choose an entry point that works for you. You may make it be a personal vision for yourself, or an envisioned future for a group or community (like American Muslims), or a fictional vision for an imagined character or group of characters, or an aspiration for a person you know. Here are some examples:
“In 2040, my son will be 26 years years old and the world I envision for him is…..”
“I expect that will be situated within academia in 2040 and hope that my colleagues and I will find ways to help make education….”
“Jon [fictional] was born today and will be 24 years old in 2040. I imagine that his life will……”
Imagine what kind of United States you would want to live in, a future where everything has turned out well, set in 2040 (pick an area or several areas from our brainstorm). What would that future be like? We may choose one two of the following areas: race, geography, government, economics, participatory politics, arts, healthcare, social justice, education, news, and environment.
Then, please consider what might have happened between now and 2040 to make this future a reality? Who or what organizations would need to be involved? What organizations, individuals and networks are already involved and how? How can we support them?
Spend no more than one hour working on this vision and no more than one more hour on editing and finalizing.
Invitation to Participate
If you’d like make your own contribution to Imagine Us, 2040, please feel free to use the above set of guidelines to create your own story on Medium and then send the link to us!
