Native slipstream

Walking the Clouds, An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction is edited by Grace Dillon. She earned her PhD in literary studies and is associate professor in the Indigenous Nations Studies program at Portland State University in Oregon.

Cyberpunk author Bruce Sterling wrote, “slipstream is a kind of writing which simply makes you feel very strange; the way that living in the twentieth century makes you feel, if you are a person of a certain sensibility."

The technique is similar to “defamiliarization”. “Defamiliarization” is the artistic technique of forcing the audience to see common things in an unfamiliar or strange way, in order to enhance perception of the familiar.

Reality is stranger than fantasy, because time is neither circular, nor linear. The future cannot be predicted because the future does not exist. The status quo is not inevitable to indigenous people. Therefore, we have to shape the future in native way of thinking. The first thing we have to is to imagine alternatives. Native slipstream is useful tool, I think.

"Native slipstream, a species of speculative fiction within the sf realm, infuses stories with time travel, alternate realities and multiverses, and alternative histories.  As its name implies, Native slipstream views time as pasts, presents, and futures that flow together like currents in a navigable stream.  It thus replicates nonlinear thinking about space-time.  In other contexts, the term slipstream often becomes a catchall for speculative writing that defies neat categorization." (p. 3)

Native slipstream provide us visionary perspective and utopian thought. Visionary perspective propse the direction and aim. Utopian thoughts are needed for fuel to keep fighting against enemy.