The Secrets of Alchemy. By Lawrence Principe. (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2013. Pp. v, 281. $25.00.)

The Sociology of Utopia, Modern Temporality and Black Visions of Liberation

“…The focus is on two African American utopias: Du Bois's 'The Comet' (1920) and the movement for reparations for slavery. It is not possible to trace the entire history of Black utopianism in this article, something which is done very ably elsewhere (Brown, 2021;Kelley, 2002;Sargent, 2020;Womack, 2013;Zamalin, 2019). While these histories often highlight the contributions of Du Bois and the reparations movement, they also include a wide range of other examples, such as: attempts to found African American towns, including the Exodusters of the 1870s and Civil Rightsleader Floyd McKissick's Soul City in the 1970s; literary utopias from Sutton E Griggs's Imperium in Imperio (1899) to Rivers Solomon's The Deep (2019).…”

“…However, if there is one text where Du Bois's utopianism comes to the fore it is his short story 'The Comet'. The story, now regarded as a pioneering text in the Afrofuturist tradition (Womack, 2013), is centred on the arrival of a comet in New York. It follows a Black man named Jim, who has survived the arrival of the comet by a combination of chance and prejudice.…”

“…Moreover, there are significant, though often overlooked, currents of non-European utopianism that challenge the exclusions of white utopianism, advancing images of new worlds that are explicitly concerned with racial justice (Ashcroft, 2016;Dutton, 2010;Pordzik, 2001). The freedom dreams articulated by Black Americanswhether directed against slavery in the 19th century, segregation in the 20th century or police killings in the 21st century -are especially instructive in this regard, providing hopeful accounts of alternative societies where racial violence has been overcome (Brown, 2021;Kelley, 2002;Sargent, 2020;Womack, 2013;Zamalin, 2019). Building on this literature, in this article, I look to Black utopias to critique and reconstitute the sociology of utopia.…”

“…First, the pivotal place of Du Bois in Black utopianism (Zamalin, 2019), early American sociology (Morris, 2015) and decolonial sociology (Burawoy, 2021;Weiner, 2018) means that 'The Comet' is a useful bridging point between utopia, sociology and race. Second, Afrofuturism, a movement focused on bringing together science fiction and the culture of the African diaspora (Womack, 2013), has become increasingly prominent in popular culture, something demonstrated by the success of the film Black Panther (2018) and Beyoncé's visual album Black Is King (2020). The utopias of the African American tradition, at least within North America, have been at the forefront of elaborating a nascent unease with the implicit whiteness of utopian imaginaries.…”