Lonny J Avi Brooks
Professor
Lonny J Avi Brooks Lonny Avi Brooks, is a full Professor in Communication and Afrofuturism, Cal State University, East Bay, a co-executive producer of The Afrofuturist Podcast; co-author, Afrofuturism 2.0: the Rise of Astro-Blackness; Lead editor, “When is Wakanda?: Afrofuturism and Dark Speculative Futurity (Journal of Futures Studies, 2019); Co-organizer, Black Speculative Arts Movement; Co-Founder of the AfroRithm Futures Group, imagining democratized futures as co-designer of the game Afro-Rithms From The Future created in 2018. Together with co-designer, Eli Kosminsky, Dr. Brooks pioneered another imagination forecasting game centering Queer Futures known as United Queerdom where it made its debut at the conference Creating Change held by the National LGBTQ Taskforce in 2019.
He co-directs the Community Futures School, Museum of Children’s Arts; is a Research Affiliate@the Institute For The Future + a Long Now Foundation Research Fellow. He is a Visiting Professor@ Hasso Plattner Institute for Design, Stanford University.
Dr. Brooks’s most recent article is “From Algorithms to AfroRithms in Afrofuturism” as a contributor to the anthology Black Experience in Design: Identity, Expression & Reflection. Dr. Brooks currently is co-editor with Tobias van Veen of the Afrofuturist Studies and Speculative Arts book series with Lexington Press.
Working with the Origami Air World Network and the Arthur C. Clarke Center for the Human Imagination’s metaFutures series, Dr. Brooks and his AfroRithm Futures Group produced the Mothership Series to introduce their Air AfroRithm ship in virtual reality (VR) as a vibrant hub for Afrofuturism establishing our presence in the metaverse or what we like to call the Pluriverse to celebrate Juneteenth (2022). With the support of the creative research foundation Fathomers and Origami Air Co., we are developing the Astro-Equalitarian Virtual Nation, a safe space for Africana and Indigenous Diasporans in the virtual reality pluriverse.
Dr. Brooks is currently at work developing the Air AfroRithm ship as a storytelling exploration game as well that bridges science fiction with issues of racial justice and historical truths to reinterpret Africana and Indigenous ancestral intelligence and recover cosmologies lost through colonial erasure to leverage as a set of resilient strategies into the future.
Dr. Brooks has provided talks and interviews about Afrofuturism and AfroRithms From The Future with the Institute From The Future and the Long Now Foundation to local television stations such as KTVU and ABC KGO TV as well as national radio programs like NPR Buffalo and Radio One Westwood.
Interview with Prof. Brooks on the Black Panther and Afrofuturism on ABC KGO TV
February 15, 2018