Our future must involve repurposing and creating new things from what we already have (instead of 20th century “destroy it all and build something completely different” modernism). Our futurism is not nihilistic like cyberpunk and it avoids steampunk’s potentially quasi-reactionary tendencies: it is about ingenuity, generativity, independence, and... See more

The dynamic echoes social and cultural geographer Tim Edensor’s idea of ruins as fluid spaces, where limits on material curiosity and imagination are let go, and exploration of alternative futures can thrive.

When ruins become places for celebration and growth, they challenge the narrative of inevitable decay. They offer us the chance to cultivate Lefebrve’s ideas of “the right to the city” through the experience of everyday inhabitation.

Rebecca Solnit explores the connection in “A Paradise Built in Hell,” articulating how amidst the destruction that disasters enact, more considerate and caring communities often arise. It’s a dynamic that can spark deep joy for those who experience it, Solnit writes — a joy that “reveals an ordinarily unmet yearning for community, purposefulness... See more