It is 2024 in Robledo, California. A young woman named Lauren Oya Olamina lives with her father, stepmother, and siblings in a small community just a few kilometres outside Los Angeles. Its inhabitants carry on their lives within walls that protect them from the chaos and destruction ravaging the West Coast of the United States. Seemingly shielded from the occasional raiders who haunt the region’s main roads, Olamina’s community must survive amidst utter calamity. With no future in sight, Lauren begins to build in her mind a set of beliefs and concepts that will form what she calls “Earthseed,” a way of life rooted in ancestral knowledge of the land and sustained by collectivity and empathy. One day, the settlement is attacked and all her loved ones are killed. Together with two other survivors of Robledo, Lauren sets out on a long journey north in search of a safe place to grow her community.
From the roots and plants she uses to make medicine and cook, Lauren envisions leading her community to the stars, away from a planet its inhabitants had destroyed. Like Lauren Olamina and her group, the March 2022 issue of A*Desk sets out to journey into the unknown, projecting other possible futures for existence on Earth.
An exploration of the cosmic from the roots, through the essays of Himali Singh Soin and Mawena Yehouessi, a conversation between Paco Chanivet and Rafal Zajko, and a story by Juliette Lizotte.
You can read the texts at the following link: https://a-desk.org/magazine/among-the-stars/
It is 2024 in Robledo, California. A young woman named Lauren Oya Olamina lives with her father, stepmother, and siblings in a small community just a few kilometres outside Los Angeles. Its inhabitants carry on their lives within walls that protect them from the chaos and destruction ravaging the West Coast of the United States. Seemingly shielded from the occasional raiders who haunt the region’s main roads, Olamina’s community must survive amidst utter calamity. With no future in sight, Lauren begins to build in her mind a set of beliefs and concepts that will form what she calls “Earthseed,” a way of life rooted in ancestral knowledge of the land and sustained by collectivity and empathy. One day, the settlement is attacked and all her loved ones are killed. Together with two other survivors of Robledo, Lauren sets out on a long journey north in search of a safe place to grow her community.
From the roots and plants she uses to make medicine and cook, Lauren envisions leading her community to the stars, away from a planet its inhabitants had destroyed. Like Lauren Olamina and her group, the March 2022 issue of A*Desk sets out to journey into the unknown, projecting other possible futures for existence on Earth.
An exploration of the cosmic from the roots, through the essays of Himali Singh Soin and Mawena Yehouessi, a conversation between Paco Chanivet and Rafal Zajko, and a story by Juliette Lizotte.
You can read the texts at the following link: https://a-desk.org/magazine/among-the-stars/
