What is the FuturesDay
and why do we need it?
together we want to rediscover rituals to foster futures imagination and deliberation - on- and offline
Our project started with a big research where we are trying to look at three main challenges. loss of rituals/ ritualised life and common events - sense of culture, (Han) “rituals as space for reconnection and resonance”, lacking culture of the future - no setting & framework, (Horx) “if we fail as humanity, we fail because of our mental constraints, racing standstill - occupied with everyday life without a lookout into the future present, (Rosa) “narrow preoccupied thinking between technological-digital utopias and the climate catastrophe - dystopia”, How can the design of future rituals look like in order to tangibly allow, imagine and test futures within a community? What’s the connection between imagining futures and rituals and how can we achieve better deliberation about different ideas through them?
WBGU & futures literacy
How can we as Designers foster future literacy? And We think there is a big potential in (re-) discovering rituals.
Our ideas are rooted in the UNESCO Futures Literacy Lab and the WBGU report “Unsere gemeinsame digitale Zukunft” (2019). According to the UNESCO, “Futures Literacy” is a capability. It is the skill that allows people to better understand the role that the future plays in what they see and do. The future does not yet exist, it can only be imagined, and we as humans have the ability to imagine. So the result is, that we are able to learn to imagine the future for different reasons and in different ways. Thereby becoming more ‘futures literate’. The WBGU report “Unsere gemeinsame digitale Zukunft” argues that "futures literacy" needs to be specifically promoted as a new research and education topic. It needs to be strengthened in existing cultural bodies (such as education, governance). And with this we need to strengthen the capabilities for digital intelligence and a better (hopefully playful) understanding of technology.
lost rituals
Why? While noting/observing that the Climate Crisis is also a “Spiritual Crisis” (loosing connection) . Rituals offer the potential for human regrowth. Therefore can give one possible answer to the “spiritual crisis” of our time.
Rituals can be defined as follows: A ritual is a mostly formal and often solemn and festive act with a high symbolic content that proceeds according to predetermined rules. Byun Chul Han (recently published a book about the loss of rituals and its consequences for us as an individual and as a group/society) defines rituals as “das Haus des Menschen”. Therefore Rituals have a stabilizing effect and they locate (us in the world).
the ritual schedule
