“Your God is a Racist, Sexist, Homophobic, and a Misogynist … Our God is Change”: Ishmael Reed, Octavia Butler and Afrofuturist Critiques of (Black) American Religion

Abstract

This article explores Afrofuturist critiques of contemporary (Black) American religion and the problematics of difference, dominance and deliverance envisioned by Black literary art in Ishmael Reed's play, The Preacher and the Rapper and Octavia Butler's novels, Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents. Though Ishmael Reed and Octavia Butler deploy similar futuristic narrative strategies, they imagine radically different futures, present distinctive strategies of intervention, and imagine differing roles for Black religion in their respective futures. This article analyzes these futuristic theological themes in light of theorists of Afrofuturism, including Kodwo Eshun, literary critics such as Tuire Valkeakari, and contemporary black religious thinkers such as Monica A. Coleman, drawing out their respective insights and implications. Taken together, Reed's and Butler's Afrofuturistic critiques offer possibilities for imagining alternative, emancipatory forms of Black theological discourse and religious practice.