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I've been angling to teach science fiction for years. SF has been a part of my reading (and viewing) life for as long as I can remember, and at one time it was a hugely important, maybe the important, part of that life. SF helped fire my imagination and pull me toward reading. It transformed my sense of the possible and made me hunger for ideas and images of what was not yet but could be.
So I was probably bound to teach SF at some point. I've assumed so for several years, but the thing is, when I got to it, I wanted to do it well. Teaching a seminar in fantasy (2006 and 2012) helped me envision what an SF course could be like, but also showed me that I wanted my SF course to be different from fantasy. I began to think seriously about what SF has in common with fantasy and what may, just may, set it apart—and these issues crystallized for me when I attended the 2013 Eaton Science Fiction Conference, co-sponsored by the Science Fiction Research Association.
Eaton/SFRA confirmed something that, on some level, I had already known, but it did so in a most dramatic way. I had known there was a scholarly field and community around science fiction, that scholars and teacher had been sharing, for many years, ways to understand and teach SF, and that, despite my own fond ties to SF over the years, I was way behind on that scholarship. Despite having invested much of my working life in the study of popular culture, and in particular the criticism and teaching of comics, I was not super-well versed in SF studies. Oh, I knew enough to know that I couldn't fake—er, work—my way into an SF studies conversation unless and until I did my homework. Eaton convinced me of that, alright, but it was a very pleasant way to be reminded of my ignorance! More than that, the conference gave me ideas and connections I couldn't possibly have anticipated, making my mental map of the SF world much larger.
This Fall's English 370 course is not my first experience teaching SF texts, but is my first-ever dedicated SF course. Working up to it, a process that began to accelerate with Eaton back in April, has been a great pleasure, not least because it has combined the pleasures of looking backward (oh yeah, I remember that writer, and that story) with the much more important pleasure of looking forward, into, as Jack Kirby said, the world that's coming. I have so much yet to learn (something I say about every field that lures me in!).
If you're going to be part of ENGL 370 this semester, welcome aboard. Strap yourself in and prepare for liftoff. We'll be reading classic and contemporary SF, yes, but also watching a film or two (or three), perhaps surveying some of the other media that SF has touched, and definitely exploring and building alien worlds. We'll also be considering how SF relates to real-world science, with a visit from a research scientist who has served as the scientific adviser for some very popular SF television series! Check out the pages listed on the banner above if you want to learn about our course requirements and texts ahead of time!
Image Credits: The image up top is from Fritz Lang's 1927 SF film classic Metropolis. The image in the middle is from Mamoru Oshii's 1995 film adaptation of Masamune Shirow's manga Ghost in the Shell. What you see below is a music video directed by Chris Cunningham for singer/performer Björk in 1999.
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