Religious Fundamentalism, Corporate Capitalism, and Pandemics in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven, and Ling Ma’s Severance
Yükleniyor...
Tarih
2021
Yazarlar
Dergi Başlığı
Dergi ISSN
Cilt Başlığı
Yayıncı
Erişim Hakkı
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Özet
While the rapid dissemination of COVID-19 took many people by surprise, major works of recent apocalyptic fiction anticipate global pandemics similar to the one we currently face. This speculative literature warns that epidemics can catalyze religious fanaticism, even in so-called modern societies, challenging the Wellsian notion that technologically advanced societies are less susceptible to religious extremism. Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake (2003), the first novel in her MaddAddam trilogy, Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven (2014), and Ling Ma’s Severance (2018) prompt us to consider how the persistence and recurrence of pandemics could affect mainstream religious views and practices. Epidemics in this literature highlight disturbing similarities between corporate capitalism and fundamentalism by portraying both as faith-based, hierarchical systems, indicating that our free market economic system may actually prime us for theocracy. These dystopias also show how sceptical, sophisticated characters can unwittingly acclimate to corporate capitalism and religious fanaticism almost as easily as they can be infected by illness. This emerging sub-genre of apocalyptic fiction indicates that organized religion and a market economy can only function beneficially when distinct from each other.
Açıklama
Anahtar Kelimeler
[Keywords Not Available]
Kaynak
Living in the End Times E-book of Abstracts
