When the inhabitants of earth run out of trees, they colonize the planet Athshe, dispossessing the small, green, furry humanoids who live there and harvesting the wood from their forests.
Tag: apocalypse
Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler
In this sequel to Parable of the Sower, Butler continues the story of Lauren Oya Olamina and her religious movement called Earthseed. Butler interweaves multiple narrators through collected journals, mostly Olamina and her daughter Larkin, but also occasionally her husband Bankole and her brother Marcus. Both Bankole and Larkin accuse Olamina of choosing Acorn and Earthseed over them. But all of Olamina’s care and work come to a horrific end when a fascist religious fanatic is elected who establishes Christian America (CA).
Dawn by Octavia Butler
Lilith Iyapo wakes up in a spaceship orbiting Earth to find out that humans have destroyed the world and made it unlivable and an alien species, the Oankali, have saved the few humans who survived the war. Lilith is charged with waking her fellow humans to establish a new Oankali-Human society on Earth.
The Environmental Manifesto
These three short texts all raise questions about apocalypse, hope, and culture change, and might serve as a starting point for inviting students to explore their own fears around climate change as well as what kinds of cultural change they hope to see.
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
This is the first of two novels (Parable of the Talents) centered around a young Black teenager named Lauren Oya Olamina. Due to climate change, a scarcity of resources (especially food and water) has led to a collapse of institutions and a rapid rise in violent crime.
Teaching Climate Change in the Humanities 