Decades before climate anxiety, political fracture and the implications of rapidly evolving technology became fixtures of our daily lives, American science-fiction writer Octavia E. Butler was already writing about the worlds they might create.

The visionary writer – widely regarded as a defining voice of what is called 'Afrofuturism' – used her speculative dystopian fiction not just to imagine the future, but to interrogate the issues present: power, race, gender, inequality, environmental collapse and, crucially, our capacity to adapt. Read today, novels like Parable of the Sower or Kindred can feel unnervingly... prophetic.

It’s this idea that sits at the centre of Octavia Butler Told You This Would Happen, an upcoming conversation at the Sydney Opera House bringing together multidisciplinary artist Atong Atem, writer and technology thinker Shae O Omonijo, and filmmaker, historian and writer Santilla Chingaipe. Together, the trio will consider Butler’s enduring influence, the patterns she recognised decades ago, and why her work has found renewed urgency among a new generation of readers, artists and thinkers.

Ahead of the conversation, RUSSH spoke with Atem, O Omonijo and Chingaipe about reading Butler in 2026, the difference between prediction and observation, and what her imagined futures might still teach us about shaping our own.

Octavia Butler is often described as 'prescient'. What do you think she understood about the world that made her imagined futures feel so relevant today?

AA: There are a lot of thinkers who are celebrated for their prescience after they pass. One thing they tend to have in common is living with some kind of marginalised identity and not ignoring the reality of such. They are also usually well read and have a very thorough understanding of history and excess empathy. Octavia Butler is one of those. She paid attention, she did her research and she was able to make some realistic conclusions.

SO: I think she really understood the trajectory of certain trends. So when she was writing in the 90s, neoliberalism was expanding, and the relationship between corporate interests and the state was becoming ever more intermingled. If you extrapolate that out into the 2020s as she did, it makes sense that she was able to display a near future that is surprisingly accurate. At the end of the day, the world is deeply shaped by human emotions and vices. Pride, greed, but also hope, collaboration, and relentless optimism.

If you were introducing someone to Butler for the first time, which book would you recommend first and why?

AA: I would introduce them to either Dawn from the Xeneogenesis trilogy (because that was my first introduction) or Wild Seed, which is one that I think about often. Butler had such a breadth to her writing capabilities that I really think people can’t go wrong.

"We know from history that the voices that shape our narratives also shape our futures and what we inherit. Ensuring that the perspectives are diverse allows us to tell the truth fully. About who we are today, and who we might become." – Santilla Chingaipe

Butler wrote about climate change, inequality, political unrest, and technological change decades ago. What can her work teach us about the world we’re living in now?

AA: Butler was honest about the world she inhabited. She was deeply feeling and insightful so the realities of mid-century America spilled onto her page. The obvious thing is that her work spoke to her political and emotional reality. I think though, that there is also something to be learned from her penchant for research. She was not a vacuum, but a conduit. She studied other writers, read science magazines, watched the news, and read slowly. Her work teaches us the importance of connecting to the collectives we are part of, even if to critique them.

As A.I. becomes more involved in writing, art, music and other creative work, what do you think we risk losing?

SC: We risk losing the things that make us human. The obvious losses are critical thinking and sustained attention, both vital to democratic societies. But from the perspective of art, the deeper loss is our connection to one another: the ability to understand another person' experience through the work they create. That matters greatly.

SO: I see the act of creating as being a very sacred act because it is how we, as human beings, express our abilities, but also our limitations. So yes, in many ways, A.I., as some people argue, can amplify what's already there. But I think what makes certain pieces of creation quite remarkable is the fact that they are produced under very strict constraints and limitations. I often find myself looking at certain things prior to the creation of generative A.I., and I'm like, 'Wow, this was done without A.I.'. You know, there's this idea that creative work has to be exemplary or extraordinary, but in reality, it just has to be an expression of that person's unique personality, and I think we risk losing the uniqueness of each individual when we converge ourselves to a statistical mean through the overuse of A.I..

AA: We risk losing perspective. A.I. can help you synthesise and amalgamate research for example. It cannot make or think or do anything. I don’t believe in A.I. art of any kind. I think the only pre-requisite for something to be art is for it to be made by a conscious being. Computers can’t do that. They are tools, yes, but not artists.

"[Butler] was not a vacuum, but a conduit. She studied other writers, read science magazines, watched the news, and read slowly. Her work teaches us the importance of connecting to the collectives we are part of, even if to critique them." – Atong Atem

Afrofuturism imagines a future for people who were often left out of traditional ideas of progress. What do you think it can teach us about how we approach A.I. and the future we face?

SC: As a historian, I'm acutely aware of the fact that the future is created in the present. Which is why it is so important that we address structural inequities to avoid replicating them in the future.

AA: Afrofuturism is also, importantly, about liberation, autonomy and self determination. Until A.I. is no longer a mechanism of oppression and theft, then it will remain antithetical to progressive movements like Afrofuturism. There are already enough somewhat necessary parts of our lives that contribute to oppression; the textile industry, mining, farming etc.; I really don’t think we need to embrace another one.

SO: There's all this talk about human-centred A.I. and wanting to put human flourishing at the centre of A.I. development. But I always say "what do you mean by 'human'?", because it is a category that historically we can't take for granted. At one point, certain people were not deemed human. They weren't deemed intelligent. They weren't deemed worthy of having their dignity respected by fellow human beings. Who we consider to be human determines how we allow technology and other developments to be distributed, developed, and determined within our communities. So once again, if you are someone who's building in the A.I. space, I encourage you to think deeply about how you're defining who you believe is worthy of human flourishing. Does it include people who don’t look like you? Think like you? And this is all across the supply chain, not just the use of the technology itself. Right? So Afrofuturism gives us a lens to understand from the most marginalised, from the people who by American law at one point in history, were deemed three-fifths of a man. How they constantly define themselves and define dignity and define human rights is crucial to how we approach A.I..

Butler also understood the importance of “writing yourself in” to the future. Why does it matter who gets to imagine – and shape – what the future looks like?

SC: It's hugely important! We know from history that the voices that shape our narratives also shape our futures and what we inherit. Ensuring that the perspectives are diverse allows us to tell the truth fully. About who we are today, and who we might become. A failure to situate diverse voices in these narratives limits our collective imagination.

AA: As Natasha Bedingfield once said “the rest is still unwritten”. That is, genuinely, a central tenant of Black Futurism and its offshoots like Afrofuturism. History has already been written but there is a powerful blank page ahead of us and embracing that gives oppressed and marginalised peoples the chance to re-write history by re-contextualising what we think we know.

"Who we consider to be human determines how we allow technology and other developments to be distributed, developed, and determined within our communities." – Shae O Omonijo

Butler imagined difficult and often unsettling futures, but there is also hope in her work. Where do you find that hope?

AA: I have two young kids so, in some ways, I have no choice but to turn hope into a verb as best as I can. Lucky for me, I have access to so much research. I look to artists, philosophers, filmmakers and my community to navigate moving into the future.

SC: In own my community, where every day people are getting up and finding ways to organise, care for one another, and reimagine the world. It is no small task, yet they keep going in the absence of little evidence that change is coming. It's impossible to not be inspired by that kind of goodness.

SO: There are certain forms of knowledge that we have deemed not worthy of reproducing or saving. And I think Butler helps us understand that there are certain pieces of knowledge and wisdom from our elders, from forms of work that we've neglected, whether it's stewarding the land or learning how to take care of oneself with little resources. These are all forms of knowledge and wisdom that we've taken for granted. So the hope that's embedded in her work is to say, let's not ignore those forms of knowledge in pursuit of the latest shining technology, right? Because just because technology theoretically is supposed to make your life easier, that doesn't necessarily mean it's better. Sometimes having access to something you created and own is more important than having or renting from a system you don't, right? So there's a great deal of hope in the text, and I think it just takes a humanities lens and an understanding of the subtext of her writing to find it in the first place.

If speculative fiction gives us permission to imagine beyond the present, what is one future you think we need to become better at imagining right now?

AA: It’s a symptom of mass 'uncreativity' that we can imagine and fund Sci-Fi-like technologies but not a future without hierarchies. So many “unfortunate facts of life” are just hurdles we haven’t collectively decided are important enough to jump over. Maybe, for instance, $50 lettuce is worth it, if it means no one has to die for my salad.

Shae O Omonijo, Atong Atem and Santilla Chingaipe will appear at the Sydney Opera House for Octavia Butler Told You This Would Happen on Sunday 4 October as part of Curious.