Feminist Speculative Fiction and Reproductive Futurisms in Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents and Louise Erdrich's Future Home of the Living God

Feminist dystopian novels have grown increasing popular in recent decades. Along with the popular and critical attention to Hulu's 2016 adaptation of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaids Tale (1985), other notable examples of feminist dystopian literature include Hillary Jordan's When She Woke (2011), Naomi Alderman's The Power (2016), Leni Zumas' Red Clocks (2018), and Louise Erdrich's Future Home of the Living God (2017). What each of these novels share, in addition to their contemporary female authorship, is the intersection of feminist cautionary tale and speculative criticism for the future of women's autonomy under the United States government. I explore novels by two prominent female authors, Octavia Butler and Louise Erdrich, who work at the cross-sections of American ethnic literature and gender studies. Both authors come from communities and cultures that have been historically and systemically underrepresented and undervalued in American society.