Marija Dalbello Reading Interests of Adults Science fiction Rutgers School of Communication and...
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Transcript of Marija Dalbello Reading Interests of Adults Science fiction Rutgers School of Communication and...
Marija Dalbello
Reading Interests of Adults
Science fiction
RutgersSchool of Communication and [email protected]
Image credit: Victor GAD
Overview _______________________________________
Introduction
What is Speculative fiction?
Science fiction and Fantasy: Points of comparison The literature of “What if?” World-building
Fandom and fan communities
History and types of science fiction
Conclusion
What is speculative fiction (SF)? _______________________________________
Speculative literature or speculative fiction
Umbrella term for science fiction, fantasy fiction, horror fiction, supernatural fiction, superhero fiction, utopian and dystopian fiction, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, and alternate history
Popularized by writers of the New Wave movement in the 1960s-1970s - genre as literary production
• Term originates from Robert A.Heinlein (1947) - synonymous with science fiction, to exclude fantasy
• Revival in the past decade to include fantasy - emphasis on literary and critical perspectives of SF writing
Comparing science fiction and fantasyThe literature of WHAT IF …?
_______________________________________
Science fictionImagination provides access to experience and social experiment
“Access to understanding and experiencing our past,present, and future in terms of an imagined future”
(Cramer 1994)Argument for an imagined world-order
Science fiction is any story that argues the case for a changed world that has not yet come into being. (Herald 2006, 313)
• Fantasy• An allegorical springboard for nostalgic leaps
to the past or into alternative worldsThe Difficult truths can sometimes only be told through
themedium of fantasy. (Herald 2000, 267)
Comparing science fiction and fantasyWorld-building
_______________________________________
Tolkien’s definition of the fantasy genre elements (from: On Fairy-Stories):
• Creation of an internally consistent secondary world (the “subcreation”)
• The use of Faerie (the use of magic and enchantment)
• World is accessed by the narrative skill of the author and the imaginative willingness of the reader
Comparing science fiction and fantasyWorld-building
_______________________________________
Extrapolative fiction - Science fiction
Abrupt transition from our world to the fantasy worldTransitions initiated by scientific mechanisms that transport us from our world to the fantasy world
• Evocative fiction - Fantasy
Another world is presented as clean and wholeAnother world is the place where the reader lives in for the length of the readingWe learn not only about an alternative world but also an entire and parallel world history, with myths and values, villains and heroes
Relevant approaches and theories
Fields of cultural production _______________________________________ Fields of cultural production (Bourdieu) expanded
beyond the producers of texts to producers of meanings around texts
Camille Bacon-Smith’s study of the culture of Worldcon conventions and fandom - ethnographic approach to describe the lived reality of science fiction community (readers and consumers of cultural products, creators and the industries)
Production and consumption in science fiction connected
Cultures of association exemplified in fandom - provide space outside of mainstream culture
Genres: science fiction, fantasy, costumers
SUCH AS IN …
Relevant approaches and theories
Fields of cultural production _______________________________________
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Historical development _______________________________________ Precursors (19th century)
1818 Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein Edgar Allan Poe, Jules Verne, H.G. Wells
• Science fiction (SF) term coined in 1929 and commonly accepted by 1930s
• The Golden Age of science fiction (1930s-1940s) Celebrates the world of patriarchal
technological modernity Focus on the mechanical, and how machines
would change the world Technology is the essence and basis for
characterization, plot is subsidiary
Alien contact (1950s) Concern with what is out there Gives rise to BEM (bug-eyed-monsters)
Historical development _______________________________________ The New Wave (1960s-1970s)
Non-mechanical sciences (novels deal with psychology, sociology, and how humans relate to their world and to change) - 1960s Feminist utopian and dystopian narratives -
1970s
Cyberpunk (starts in 1980s)• Technology is portrayed as being limited• Dystopian visions of technology and progress
Scientific advances (starts in 1990s) New technological developments
(nanotechnology, AI, bioengineering) become a visible force of the field
The Future at Risk (last decade)
Technology themes, dystopian visions, eco-terrorism, identities, etc.
An overview Types and Trends_______________________________________ Hard SF
Stories set in near future - focus on plausible science Scientists and their families, and those
immediately affected by science Includes:
Space travel and planetary exploration Utopian science fiction
• New Wave Stories set in the near future - focus on the
soft sciences (sociology, psychology, even religion) Focus on social order and politics (morality
in focus) The “imaginative vision” for the present Literary in nature (speculative fiction)
Slide based on handout developed by Bonnie Kunzel
An overview
Types and Trends _______________________________________ Science and Sociology
Social consequences of technical and scientific change Focus on biotechnology, computers, robots,
nanotechnology, artificial intelligence Cyberpunk
Technology of the internet and hacker culture set in the near future, including elements of popular culture
The Future at Risk
• Social consequences of technical and scientific change - focus on disaster or socio-economic focus• Includes:
• Disaster fiction (response to natural occurrences such as mutation) and apocalyptic end of everything• Dystopia: consequences of everyday behavior taken to extremes (a negative vision of politics, society, economy, and science and technology; feminist perspectives
Slide based on handout developed by Bonnie Kunzel
An overview
Types and Trends _______________________________________ Space opera
“Westerns in Spacesuits” on other planets, with stereotypical characters Including: Galactic Empires, Military Science
Fiction, The Great Conflict, After the Fall
Inner space and special powers Focus on the human mind and its powers, verging
on fantasy Including: extrasensory powers, religious and
messianic fiction
Slide based on handout developed by Bonnie Kunzel
Conclusion _______________________________________
Science fiction is closely related to fantasy Imagining an alternative social order and society
Reflecting on the consequences of technological modernity
Reflecting on the consequences of techno-scientific progress
Imagining the limits of humanity and its dystopian futures
Imagining transcendent humanity and its utopian advancement