Diverse Futures

Visions of Care in a Complex World.

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“We must strive, in the face of the here and now’s totalizing rendering of reality, to think and feel a then and there...”
— José Esteban Muñoz, Cruising Utopia
“Imagine a world without prisons, police, and borders. Then imagine what you can do to make that happen. Then try it.
Repeat, repeat, repeat.”
— Monica Trinidad
“What we cannot imagine cannot come into being.”
— bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions
“Imagining what a new world might look like is a form of resistance. In the process, we might just help us find the inspiration we need to start building it.”
— Grace Blakeley, Capitalism is Killing the Future

Our Next Presentation

Head shot of T. Aaron Cisco wearing dark-rimmed glasses, a white turtleneck sweater, and a tan coat.

Who Broke the Future?

July 15th, 2026 at 7:00pm

Our first presentation will be Who Broke the Future? with T. Aaron Cisco.

Cisco is an Afrofuturist writer and lifelong nerd. Their talk will move between personal storytelling, reading excerpts and speculative worldbuilding, and cultural reflection. Cisco will share how his own work wrestles with questions of power, memory, and responsibility, and how fandom itself can be both a refuge and a battleground for imagining who gets to exist in the future.

RSVP link coming soon.

Full Schedule

We are still working to finalize which presenters will present on which dates, so the ordering below may change. In the meantime, you can block these dates out on your calendar:

All presentations will start at 7:00pm at Northern Commons.

Motivation

What Is Diverse Futures?

Imagination opens us. It makes impossible things possible. It jostles us free from our chimeric yolks. What can our future be? Imagine with us. Imagine a future where diversity is embraced. Imagine a future of caring—caring for each other and our planet.

Northern Commons is hosting a series of lectures and discussions. Each session features a different presenter and that presenter's view of what the future can be. Come, join us for these events.

Request for Proposals

The proposal period for the 2026 Diverse Futures series has closed. If you are interested to see where we were aiming, you can click here to view the request for proposals.

Where We Are

We’re living through a time of profound unraveling. Climate disruption. Political polarization. Widespread anxiety, depression, and loneliness. The headlines reflect what many feel in their bodies: a sense of fragmentation, overwhelm, and disconnection from each other, from purpose, and from life itself.

For millennia, people have preached that, if only we would unite behind their (religious, political, scientific, or technological) vision, we would overcome our differences, end suffering, and bring about planet-wide flourishing.

What can we accomplish if we finally accept that a single vision will never be enough?

What Is Next

Now, it is the year 2275. Humanity has accepted its interdependence with all life on this planet. Difference is embraced rather than quashed. Instead of top-down-driven global “solutions” bolted onto the crumbling mountains of past top-down-driven global “solutions,” problems are met with curiosity rather than dogma and addressed with stewardship rather than dominance. Not all of 2026’s problems are solved, but the world is recovering.

  • What are things like in this new New World Order?
  • How is difference fostered or managed?
  • How do humans (and all creatures) find their place and their kin?
  • How do we care for each other and for the planet as a whole?
  • How are resources and solutions propagated?

What seed-sproutings, events, or epiphanies led us here?

Share Your Vision

Northern Commons will host a series of 40–60-minute presentations/talks. We want you to present your vision of the future.

You will:

  • Submit a 100–500-word teaser for or an outline of your vision,
  • Create durable artifacts of your vision (e.g., written word, artwork), and
  • Give a presentation or lead a talk about your vision.

Talks can be either a short 15–20 minute intro to your vision, followed by a directed discussion inspired by it, or a 40–60 minute lecture on your vision, followed by friendly probing of its boundaries.

Relational will:

  • Select speakers based upon the submitted teasers,
  • Award each speaker a stipend of $200,
  • Promote the series and each presentation,
  • Provide space for the presentations in St. Paul, MN,
  • Record each presentation, and
  • Upload the recording to a public location.

To be considered, please fill out this Submission Form by May 1, 2026.

Note: this is open to presenters anywhere. However, the presentations must be in-person in St. Paul, MN. At this time, Northern Commons is not able to provide travel or accommodations for presenters.