Stefaniya:
C2: Definitions of SF Terms
Novum – the scientifically plausible innovations used by science fiction narratives.
Novum
1
SF Subgenres
Santos:
1/ Slipstream- a fictional source that crosses boundaries in genre.
2/Scientific Romances- late 19th century and early 20th century British science fiction stories that focus on the good and evil of advanced technology.
3) Space Opera- a drama taking place in outer space that often consist of space warfare, extraterrestrials, romance, neologisms, and advance technology.
4) Steampunk- fictional text that often takes place in the Victorian era and features advanced steam powered machinery and weaponry.
5) – Cyberpunk- genre of fiction where society is dominated by computers and artificial intelligence.
What is the difference between the sf sub-genres of steampunk and cyberpunk?
– Both steampunk and cyberpunk have to do with the advancement of technological innovations, but the difference between them is the time period. Steampunk involves a more 19th century wild wild west time period with the combination of fictional technology and the innovative technology of that time. An example would be the movie Atlantis: The Lost Empire. While cyberpunk involves a more modern time period with the combination of technological advancements in this time period and the addition of more fictional innovations. An example would be Blade Runner.
6/ Hard SF is based on science, but not necessarily scientific fact. Works of hard SF make use of the scientific method, where it is not only important to know that something is possible, but also to know how it is possible and why it was made possible. Things that are not based on currently proven scientific facts have to be justified with their own scientific logic. It may be more appropriate to think of it as “fictional science.” (Robert)
Canon v. Megatext
Are “canon” and “megatext” synonyms? If not, how do they differ? Are they related?
Yes, they are related, but they are not synonymous. They are both used to describe SF and other genres, but they are based on different perspectives. A megatext is outlined by authors that contribute to certain themes and sub-genres by creating alternative and derivative works from each other. A canon is outlined by the general community on which individual works contributed to the overall culture of the genre.
Hard SF (Robert)
Hard SF is based on science, but not necessarily scientific fact. Works of hard SF make use of the scientific method, where it is not only important to know that something is possible, but also to know how it is possible and why it was made possible. Things that are not based on currently proven scientific facts have to be justified with their own scientific logic. It may be more appropriate to think of it as “fictional science.”
RWA4: Reading Bradbury, Bester, and Asimov
RWA4.1: Reading Bradbury, Bester, and Asimov
Please print out copies of the Bester and Asimov short stories (copies of Bradbury’s short story were distributed in class). Please read all three texts from start to finish.  Then, briefly write about your response to each in your reading journal.  Afterward, please read each again, this time taking notes and attending to the story’s elements as a fictional text (plot, character, setting, narrative perspective, figurative language, themes) more carefully, its relationships to various issues related to science fiction as a genre and to some recurring elements or properties of science fiction texts. Afterward, please write some more about each story and the essay, what you now understand about them, and questions that you have about them, making sure to attend to the What, How, Why, So What? elements of each.
Finally, please select one reading question related to the Bester story and one to the Asimov story and post your response to both as comments on this post BY MIDNIGHT, SUNDAY, MARCH 5.Â
Though not required, please feel free to post links that you may have consulted in the process of reading the stories and why you found them helpful.  What is required is that you read the texts carefully, write about them in your reading journal, and think about them in the context of our class discussions, Delany’s fiction and criticism, Russ’s “The Second Inquisition,” Pohl’s “Day Million,” Philip K. Dick’s short story “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale,” our discussions about that story, the issues and topics raised in the “Introduction” to the Wesleyan Anthology of Science Fiction and the collection of responses gathered in “Why Do You Read Science Fiction.”  We will be discussing the stories and your reading questions in our next class session.
RWA4.2: Literary Studies and SF Keywords: Please select five terms related to the elements of fiction and five terms related to SF studies and define them.  You can post your definitions as a comment on the SF Keywords post or print out a copy of these and hand them in to me next Monday.
How To Approach a Text: Professor Rodgers’ Guidelines for Textual Description, Analysis, and Interpretation
How To Approach a Text: Guidelines for Textual Description, Analysis, and Interpretation
What? Â [title, author, date, narrative perspective (s), plot synopsis, setting, characters, themes, genre(s), publication history]
How? [how is it structured? sections? acts? argument? Â references?]
Why? [what may the title mean? why is this text interesting and important in the context of the author’s work and in the context of sf studies generally?  what questions does the text raise?  What is unique about it?]
Select one short passage for us to discuss together. [why this passage?]
So What? [3 Discussion Questions for the Class]
March 1, 2017 Class Notes
Ray Bradbury, “There Will Come Soft Rains” (1954)
What:  Bradbury, Ray.  “There Will Come Soft Rains.” Collier’s, 1950.
Objective, third person narrator who is unnamed and may or may not be human.  Some possibilities include:  The house?  A surveillance system? A survivor? A “nanny cam”? A security system?  The robots?
Characters: four people: Mrs. McClellan, her husband and two children.  There is also a dog and nine thousand robot attendants.  A Mr. Featherstone is mentioned.  We don’t know who he is, but it is his birthday. Â
Did the house live? Â Did the house die? Â Is the house destroyed? Â
Is the house the narrator? Â Why or why not?
Why are there robot mice?
Narration: Â highly objective, precise, quantitative, all seeing, all knowing, stylistically the narration reads as some kind of report,
Diction: highly factual
Clocks: time, order, end of things, Doomsday Clock,
Elon Musk lives in a smart house. Â
Why would the author or narrator have chosen the “interior of a clock shop at midnight” as an image for the last section of this story? Â
Cogs are still in motion in a clock shop, despite being no one to attend to, clocks still function, clock shop would be loud at midnight (sounding alarms), “end of time/end  of times”, new beginning, midnight is when both hands overlap and it is simultaneously the beginning and end of a day. Â
How do we define and organize time?
Is this story about time travel?
“Day Million” by Frederick Pohl
“We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” by Philip K. Dick
“Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones” by Samuel Delany
“The Second Inquisition” by Joanna Russ
Compare/Contrast: Â all of the stories we have read deal with the future of humanity; utopia/dystopia; utopic/dystopic
Humans can disappear, but time continues.  “There Will Come Soft Rains” is a story about time.  It is structured by time,
In what way is the Teasdale poem a metonym for the story?
Nature is ultimately more powerful than technologies in this story. Â
Time is relative!
Technologies appear to improve with time. Â But are also irrelevant without people to use them. Â Technologies may breakdown. Â They may also post-date humans. Â
Class Notes: February 22, 2017
We will be finishing up our discussion of Delany’s essay and short story next Monday. At that time, we will also discuss the excellent contributions to the SF Keywords definitions. I encourage you to read/re-read Delany’s essay and story, the notes below, the Delany posts, and the SF Keywords posts before our class next Monday.
February 22, 2017
“Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones” by Samuel Delany, which was published in the late 1960s, is a short story.  The main character is a middle-ranked reluctant thief who simply wants to make a better living.  HCE are the initials used consistently in the multiple names and identities attached to the protagonist and narrator.  HCE as a woman meets Maud, who is an agent and wearing the stone of Jasper, which is a word, and he is not sure if he should approach her or not.  Set in the future, in year –75 (space travel to Triton and Mars, three subways in NYC, three dimensional imaging/holographs, at least 500 years into the future (237)).  Arty, Maud, Singer, HCE (at least three separate characters: the orphan boy named Harold Claney Everett growing up on a farm in Vermont, the small time crook named Hank Culford Eccles, the woman in the high heels named Harmony C. Eventide, big time Hector Calhoun Eisenhower.  Ending appears to be unclear; no big finale.  Consistent limited first person narrator.  Most of the story takes place in a future NYC.
- 256: Â The whole plotof the story appears to be reflected in this passage because throughout the story, Maud has a problem with HCE becoming a big boss. Â Maud wants only one top level boss and many lower level thieves.
Crime does pay
Space travel
Digital imaging technologies
Questions:
1/ Why are the rising people the most dangerous?
2/ Why are the Singers so important?
3/ If HCE is always immersed in his new identities, how/why is he found?
“About 5, 750,” published in 1969? is an essay about how you can use different words to express the same thing and claims that there is no separation between style and content in fiction.  The change of a single word in a 700 page novel could be important (2).  Delany also emphasizes how each word revises the context of the words the precede it.  Word choice matters to build up a story.
- 3:
D
Why might Delany’s style be important for writers and readers?  1/ For example, how might Delany’s ideas about writing influence other writers?  How might they influence and affect readers?
2/ Is Delany’s style/ideas used by other science fiction writers/other fiction writers?
3/ How do you think the “structure” of someone’s writing affect the reader.
In “About 5, 750 Words,” D. argues that one’s choice of words matters.  In “Time Considered a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones,” he appears to be putting into practice some of his ideas in “About 5, 750 Words.”  It is important to notice the passage on p. 222.
What is the significance of the Singers?
What does the title mean?
Group Work: Delany February 22, 2017
Story: Yaya, Kyle, Giovanni, Lorelei (DF), Robert, Oni (GF), Andy
Essay: Ermis (DF), Vlad (GF), Jonathan, Santos, David, Edwin, Josh
Connections: Hussein (GF), Joseph (DF), Michael, Noshin, Jose, Miquel, Sali, Dorian
How To Approach a Text: Guidelines for Textual Description, Analysis, and Interpretation
What? Â [title, author, date, narrative perspective (s), plot synopsis, characters, themes, genre(s), publication history]
How? [how is it structured? sections? acts? argument? Â references?]
Why? [what may the title mean? why is this text interesting and important in the context of the author’s work and in the context of sf studies generally? Â what questions does the text raise? Â What is unique about it?]
Select one short passage for us to discuss together. [why this passage?]
So What? [3 Discussion Questions for the Class]
RWA3: Reading Delany’s Fiction and Criticism and Responding to Course Questions
There are two parts to this week’s assignment:
Part 1/RWA3.1: Reading Delany’s Fiction and Criticism and Part 2/RWA3.2: Responding to Course Questions. Â Both are DUE BY MIDNIGHT TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 21.
RWA3.1:Â Reading Delany’s Fiction and Criticism
Please print out a copy of Samuel Delany’s short story “Time Considered as a Helix of Precious Stones” (1969) and his 1968 essay “About 5,750 Words” (1968)  Please read both texts from start to finish.  Then, briefly write about your response to each in your reading journal.  Afterward, please read both again, this time taking notes and attending to the story’s elements as a fictional text (plot, character, setting, narrative perspective, figurative language, themes) more carefully, its relationships to various issues related to science fiction as a genre and to some recurring elements or properties of science fiction texts, and in what ways specific elements of this story may relate to Delany’s essay about the writing and study of fiction.   Afterward, please write some more about each story and the essay, what you now understand about them, and questions that you have about them.
Finally, please post three paragraphs in response to this post BY MIDNIGHT, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 21, the first briefly summarizing Delany’s story and describing it in terms of its elements as a fictional text, the second briefly summarizing Delany’s essay, the third explaining what you found most interesting about each text and how the two texts may relate to one another. Â [Please note: if it is easier to write about each text separately, feel free to use the third paragraph to write about Delany’s story and add a fourth for the essay] Â Finally, feel free to post one to three questions that you have about the texts.
Though not required, please feel free to post links that you may have consulted in the process of reading the stories and why you found them helpful.  What is required is that you read the two texts carefully, write about them in your reading journal, and think about them in the context of our class discussions, Russ’s “The Second Inquisition,” Pohl’s “Day Million,” Philip K. Dick’s short story “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale,” our discussions about that story, the issues and topics raised in the “Introduction” to the Wesleyan Anthology of Science Fiction and the collection of responses gathered in “Why Do You Read Science Fiction.”  We will be discussing the storiy and essay and your responses to both in our next class session.
RWA3.2: Responding to Course Questions: Please PRINT OUT a copy of our “Course Questions: Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2017”  Read over the 26 questions.  Professor Rodgers has suggested that these 26 questions fall into five broad categories:  C1/ definitions of literary terms, C2/ definitions of SF terms/keywords, C3/ questions related to Russ’s and Pohl’s stories, C4/ discussion questions related to reading and interpreting science fiction texts, C5/ questions about course assignments.  Make a note of which category you would assign to each of the 26 questions.  Of the questions that you have categorized as belonging to C1, C2, or C3, select 3 questions to respond to and post your responses as a reply to this post.
For extra credit: If you are responding to a question related to defining an SF studies term/keyword (C2), also post your definition as a reply to the SF Keywords Post. Â If you are responding to a question related to Russ’s and/or Pohl’s story, also post your response as a reply to the Reading Russ/Pohl Post.
