By Brooke Lilek *Chestnut: something repeated to the point of staleness; a trope Phoebe heard a knock on the front door and froze. An extreme reaction for someone who cannot sense death at her doorstep, but that’s Phoebe. She tensed before checking the peephole. She found no one out front though. Phoebe threw the deadbolt […]

By: Kylie Poling Dr. Deborah Mix, Professor of English at Ball State University, obtained her BA at Oglethorpe University, and her MA and PhD at Purdue University. Dr. Mix’s area of expertise relates to experimental writing, especially poetry. Her current published works include literature by Gertrude Stein, Toni Morrison, and many others, ranging in topics from […]

By: Maggie Mayer Food is an integral part of daily life. It has the power to comfort, to connect others, and celebrate a shared heritage. Even more simply, food is a necessity to live: so it is understandable that food has become a constant image and metaphor within dystopian and utopian genres. There are many […]

By: Fila’Sha Finley Have you ever wondered how The Hunger Games became so successful? The Public Relations Director has your answers! Executive Summary: The first annual Hunger Games will be implemented in Panem in a couple months and I am one of the reasons that the Hunger Games will be so successful. My name is […]

By: Rachael Carmichael In “The Rain,” a Danish post-apocalyptic series, a group of survivors fight to keep their humanity and search for hope in their newfound dystopia. Two siblings, Simone and Rasmus Andersen, are forced to take shelter in a bunker with their parents when a deadly virus sweeps through Scandinavia by rainfall. The siblings’ […]

By: Kirsten Cooper When seeking out a modern utopian work, Tomorrowland stands out because it depicts a substantial first step to solving some of the world’s problems. Tomorrowland is a movie based loosely off of the Disneyland theme park which explores the possibilities of the future that bears the same name as the film. In the movie, Tomorrowland […]

By: Marisa Sloan The charcoal morning spilled through the palm-sized window of my room. I jolted against the checkered metal as a searing weight collapsed on my chest. I clawed at the walls, convulsing as barbs of pain jabbed me with every breath. A foot away from me, the light of the monitor flooded me […]

By: Sammy Bredar The land is perfect: endless partying, harmonious subjects, and the inability to lie. This appears to be a utopian land for the fey, or the magical creatures who live in the world of Faerie. This seemingly perfect world is riddled with betrayal, which lends itself to dystopian themes, such as isolated society, […]

By: Natalie Kuss WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS! Overpopulation has created numerous complications over the last few decades, including crowding and food shortages, for a variety of countries across the globe. In these areas, overpopulation has caused panic for both citizens and those who govern them due to the increasing inability to support more people. […]

By: Katrina Brown “Good and evill we know in the field of this World grow up together almost inseparably; and the knowledge of good is… involv’d and interwoven with the knowledge of evill”                                                                                      -John Milton, Areopagitica Dystopias and utopias have remained a point of fascination because of both their extreme nature and their ability to […]