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The Naissance of Dystopia

Zhao Rourou   

  1. Department of Minority Languages and Literatures, Minzu University of China
  • Online:2019-01-25 Published:2019-04-29
  • About author:Zhao Rourou, Ph. D., is a lecturer of Department of Minority Languages and Literatures, Minzu University of China, specializing in cultural studies, English literature, and cinema studies.

Abstract: Dystopia is one of the most critical narratives of the popular culture. To some extent, it is beyond interpretation because of its definition: it is well known that dystopia refers to a bad place while utopia means a good place; that is, dystopia is a negative utopia. But if we look into the works that are called dystopias, it is obvious that they do not simply disavow what utopias insist. They also deal with various theses like feminism, post-humanism, modernity, etc. This paper focuses on the emergence of dystopia from the beginning and tries to analyze its discursive formation.

Key words: dystopia, utopia, George Orwell