Octavia E. Butler wrote a novel in 1993 that has gained popularity in the academic spectrum. It is a post-apocalyptic knowledge literature novel that addresses climate modification and socioeconomic inequalities (Iossifidis, 2020). Several people have ventured into the novel and strived to learn about the Earthseed area she created by first analyzing the study and applying the lesson to real-life situations (Dunning, 2020). The believers of this faith are destined to live on other planets. Social justice thinking and music are aspects the novel has influenced dramatically.
If I were to write a proposal on the novel The Parable of the Sower, I would choose to venture more into how climate change has been contributed by people living on Earth. The reason for choosing the subject is that climatic collapse is a big theme in the novel, which returns the globe to the Ancient World, the Middle Ages (Huff, 2021). I believe Butler’s choice to address this problem as an intersectional one is excellent. One of the research questions to be employed in my research question is how the novel writer represents climate change. Does the writer show possible solutions to the issue of climate change? How well does the writer address the issue of climate change? By answering the above question, I will understand the issue of climate change as addressed in the novel.
The topic I have selected can be gotten from the following section of the book. An exact extract from the book is that the writer says, “people have changed the climate of the world. Now they are waiting for the old days to come back” (Brown, 2019, para 35). The extract shows undoubtedly unabated climate change, which Butler portrays as an intersectional concern (Reagon, 2021). Lastly, climate change is addressed in the novel and global concern. Thus, addressing it will help reduce the issue.
References
Brown, F. (2019). “Parable of the Sower” by Octavia E. Butler: Summary & Analysis. Stories for Earth. Web.
Dunning, S. K. (2020). “Learn or die”: Survivalism and anarchy in Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower. In Human Contradictions in Octavia E. Butler’s Work (pp. 179-194). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Gutierrez, C. (2021). Darkness among the moon and the stars: Family formation under poverty in Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower. In 2021 NEIU Student Research and Creative Activities Symposium (p. 2). NEIU Digital Commons.
Huff, N. (2021). Climate Refugees in Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower. In 2021 NEIU Student Research and Creative Activities Symposium (p. 1). NEIU Digital Commons.
Iossifidis, M. J. M. (2020). Reading Parable of the Sower online in a pandemic: Collectively imagining different futures with Octavia E. Butler’s speculative fiction. Literary Geographies, 6(2), 156-164.