1 - Urban Futures that Rainforests Speculate

Geographers and anthropologists have drawn attention to space and places as future-making resources (Bunnell, 2022; Bryant & Knight, 2019). While national-scale place references and physical experiences are considered key elements of urban imaginaries, much less attention has been afforded to speculative interventions. In this paper, I examine the speculations of Malaysian cities in the framework of eco-futurisms, which place rainforests prominently at the centre of the imaginaries.

My project records rainforests as mediated and affective sites of urban future-making in Southeast Asia. Rainforests, in these works, are often addressed through their material features that invite the practitioners to respond (Ingold, 2011). The humidity, smells, and sounds have been woven into the orientation of certain city experiences as futuristic in embodied manners. By tracing the theme of rainforests in the grid of sensations – in science fiction writing, films, and eco-art works – I seek to understand how rainforests are mobilised to produce aspirations of ecological urban futures.

I focus on Malaysian creative organisations involving writers, artists, and botanical initiatives on the island of Borneo. By conducting semi-structured interviews and doing ethnography, I aim to (a) provide ecological versions of imagining urban futures by sorting out the artistic and designing efforts in Sarawak and Sabah, in the 21st century Malaysia, (b) and unfold these versions in the networks of creators’ talents, socio-political contexts, environmental challenges, technological innovations, and global climate change agenda.