The 9th City Tech Science Fiction Symposium on SF, Artificial Intelligence, and Generative AI was a resounding success! It was well attended and the discussions followed after it despite it being our first event back in person since the beginning of COVID. Below, you will find videos of each session and a selection of photographs by Andrew Porter, the Hugo-winning editor and publisher.
Videos
9:00AM Opening Remarks Jason Ellis and Justin F. Vázquez-Poritz
9:20AM Paper Session 1 Moderator: Wanett Clyde Jason Ellis, “A History of Generative AI in SF” Jacob Adler, “The End Zone: A.I. as a Commentary on the Human Condition in 17776” Martijn J. Loos, “A Plea for Theory: The Relationship Between Real-World AI and its Representation in Science Fiction”
10:50AM Paper Session 2 Moderator: Kel Karpinski Virginia L. Conn, “The Tyranny of Neutrality in AI 2041” Nathan Lamarche, “Monotheistic Ethics in Caprica: The Consequences of AI Development on Queer Futurity” Adam McLain, “Computational Poetics: Franny Choi’s Soft Science and the Dialogues to Come”
1:10PM Student Panel Moderators: Jill Belli and Vivian Zuluaga Papp Lucas Felipe Journey Ford Malik Joseph Christine Retirado Ronald Hinds
2:10PM Asimov’s/Analog Writers’ Panel Moderator: Emily Hockaday Sarah Pinsker Mercurio D. Rivera Sakinah Hoefler Matthew Kressel
4:00PM Keynote Address Speaker: Marleen S. Barr, “Science Fiction/AI/Feminism: A Temporal Progression” Moderator: Leigh Gold
Photos by Andrew Porter
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above: Emily Hockaday
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above: Sakinah Hoefler
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
Above L to R: Matthew Kressel, Mercurio D. Rivera, Sakinah Hoefler, Sarah Pinsker, and Emily Hockaday
The event is free and open to the public. Pre-registration for this in-person event is not required. Participants and attendees who are not affiliated with the college will need to sign-in at the security desk before entering and walking down the hallway to the right to room A-105.
Program
9:00AM Opening Remarks
Jason Ellis and Justin F. Vázquez-Poritz
9:15AMBreak
9:20AMPaper Session 1
Moderator: Wanett Clyde
Jason Ellis, “A History of Generative AI in SF”
Jacob Adler, “The End Zone: A.I. as a Commentary on the Human Condition in 17776”
Martijn J. Loos, “A Plea for Theory: The Relationship Between Real-World AI and its Representation in Science Fiction”
10:40AMBreak
10:50AM Paper Session 2
Moderator: Kel Karpinski
Virginia L. Conn, “The Tyranny of Neutrality in AI 2041”
Nathan Lamarche, “Monotheistic Ethics in Caprica: The Consequences of AI Development on Queer Futurity”
Adam McLain, “Computational Poetics: Franny Choi’s Soft Science and the Dialogues to Come”
12:10PM Lunch
1:10PMStudent Panel
Moderators: Jill Belli and Vivian Zuluaga Papp
Lucas Felipe
Journey Ford
Malik Joseph
Christine Retirado
Ronald Hinds
2:00PMBreak
2:10PMAsimov’s/Analog Writers’ Panel
Moderator: Emily Hockaday
Sarah Pinsker
Mercurio D. Rivera
Sakinah Hoefler
Matthew Kressel
3:50PMBreak
4:00PMKeynote Address
Moderator: Leigh Gold
Speaker:
Marleen S. Barr
“Science Fiction/AI/Feminism: A Temporal Progression”
Participants
Jacob Adler has been part of the CUNY system for a number of years now, most recently as the Cataloging and Metadata Librarian for the Lloyd Sealy Library at the John Jay College for Criminal Justice. In September 2024, he contributed to Space, the Feminist Frontier, a scholarly book publication about feminist topics related to the Star Trek franchise. Since 2022 he has been involved with providing educational material about artificial intelligence, including creating academic research guides and delivering presentations in CUNY and throughout the Westchester Library System. Other than AI, his interests include media history, fiction writing, and tabletop role-playing games.
Marleen S. Barr is known for her pioneering work in feminist science fiction scholarship and has recently retired from teaching English at the City University of New York. She has won the Science Fiction Research Association Award for Lifetime Contribution to Science Fiction Scholarship. Barr is the author of Alien to Femininity: Speculative Fiction and Feminist Theory, Lost in Space: Probing Feminist Science Fiction and Beyond, Feminist Fabulation: Space/Postmodern Fiction, and Genre Fission: A New Discourse Practice for Cultural Studies. Barr has edited many science fiction critical anthologies and co-edited the science fiction issue of PMLA. She is the author of the novels Oy Pioneer! and Oy Feminist Planets: A Fake Memoir. Her When Trump Changed: The Feminist Science Fiction Justice League Quashes the Orange Outrage Pussy Grabber is the first single authored Trump short story collection. It is followed by This Former President: Science Fiction as Retrospective Retrorocket Jettisons Trumpism. Her latest critical anthology is Jewish Women Writers Create Science Fiction: Gender, Temporality–and Yentas.
Jill Belli is Associate Professor of English at New York City College of Technology, CUNY, where she happily teaches science fiction and utopian studies often. She’s working on long-standing projects on well-being & happiness in education and writing & revising in speculative fiction. Newer interests include nature writing, healing & illness, tarot & astrology as storytelling / intuitive literacy, and grief. Learn more about Jill and her interdisciplinary research and teaching: jillbelli.org.
Wanett Clyde is the Collections Management Librarian at CUNY’s New York City College of Technology, where in addition to managing the library’s collection she oversees the university archives. Her research seeks to explore the intersection of Black history and fashion history, drawing out under credited African-American contributors, their critical innovations and accomplishments, and other meaningful connections in the overlapping research spheres.
Virginia L. Conn is a Teaching Assistant Professor at Stevens Institute of Technology. She researches depictions of the “new socialist human” in socialist science fiction and how those depictions guided policy decisions in Mao-era China, Soviet Russia, and East Germany. She is currently working on her book manuscript, which offers a literary-material account of the relationship between socialist literary policies and the concurrent sociopolitical and technological drive to create the “new human” in daily life. She is also the managing editor of the Science Fiction Research Association Review.
Lucas Felipe is a student at City Polytechnic High School of Engineering, Architecture, and Technology.
Journey Ford is an Entertainment Technology student at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Leigh Dara Gold is a Doctoral Lecturer in the English Department at City Tech. She currently teaches composition, fiction, poetry, women’s literature, and several other literature classes. Her doctoral work, completed at NYU in 2011, explored mourning in the work of Else Lasker-Schüler using several theoretical approaches, among them feminist, trauma, and poetic theories. Since then, she has deepened her focus on interdisciplinary work such as writing about Ursula K. Le Guin, Mary Shelley, Eastern philosophies and ethics, trauma in women writers of science fiction, including Octavia Butler, and the role of the body in poetry. Leigh contributed an essay to an anthology edited by Marleen S Barr about Jewish women science fiction authors which was just published. She is currently also writing fiction and poetry about women, writing, and philosophy. She is thrilled to be a part of this wonderful Symposium and that some of her amazing students are a part of it this year!
Ronald Hinds is a Professional and Technical Writing student at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Emily Hockaday is the senior managing editor of Analog Science Fiction and Fact and Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine. She coedited the horror anthology Terror at the Crossroads with Jackie Sherbow and is the editor of the speculative poetry anthology Heartbeat of the Universe. Hockaday is the author of Naming the Ghost, Blood Music, and In a Body. She has received grants from the De Groot Foundation, Café Royal Cultural Foundation, NYFA City Artist Corps, and Queens Council on the Arts. You can find her at www.emilyhockaday.com.
Sakinah Hoefler is a fiction writer, poet, and playwright. She’s a proud recipient of the 2023 Analog Award for Emerging Black Voices. Her work has been published both domestically and internationally, and her plays have been produced by places such as Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music. A former chemical engineer for the United States Department of Defense, she currently teaches writing at Princeton University. She resides in Newark, NJ with her wonderful husband and adorable son.
Malik Joseph is a student at City Polytechnic High School of Engineering, Architecture, and Technology.
Kel R. Karpinski (they/he) is the IT/ILL Librarian and Associate Professor at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY. Their research focuses on mid-century queer films and novels as they relate to sailors and hustlers in Times Square and how these texts map queer desire onto the city. Kel is also a zine maker and a NY Queer Zine Fair organizer.
Matthew Kressel is a multiple Nebula and World Fantasy Award nominated author and coder. His many works of short fiction have appeared in Analog, Asimov’s, Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, Tor.com/Reactor, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and many other publications and anthologies, including multiple Year’s Bests. Eighteen of his stories will be included in his debut collection, Histories Within Us, coming from Senses Five Press in February. His far-future novel Space Trucker Jess is coming in 2025 from Fairwood Press. And his Mars-based novella The Rainseekers is forthcoming from Tordotcom in early 2026. Alongside Ellen Datlow, he runs the Fantastic Fiction at KGB reading series in Manhattan. And he is the creator of the Moksha submissions system, used by many of the largest fiction publishers today.
Nathan Lamarche is a Master of Arts in English student at the University of Alberta. Their current studies focus on writing centres and composition theory, Indigenous and queer fiction storytelling, and the relational impacts of technology on our perspectives of the self, with a keen interest on the development of AI technology through the anthropomorphisation of social-oriented technologies and services and their impacts on society, the parallel between Generative AI and monotheistics ethics, and AI’s disproportionate impact on cultural and queer marginalisation. They have received several awards and scholarships, including the Sarah Nettie Christie Scholarship, the Belcourt Brosseau Métis Awards, and The Kerry Wood Memorial Award in Arts.
Vivian Li designed this year’s event poster. She is a graphic designer specializing in branding and visual storytelling, but more than anything she’s just another human who wants to make the world a brighter and more connected place through thoughtful design. She believes that in a world increasingly driven by technology and AI, design has the power to bring a vital human touch to the exciting digital landscape. Her mission is to craft visuals that resonate emotionally, adding warmth and personality to fast-paced modern experiences. Connect with her at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivian-l-8a177b19b/.
Martijn J. Loos is a Dutch PhD candidate at New York University’s department Comparative Literature. He has a RMA in Comparative Literary Studies from Utrecht University and has taught at University College Tilburg. He works at the intersection of science fiction and philosophy, with a special emphasis on the relationship between the (political) real and the science-fictional. He has published on, amongst others, H. P. Lovecraft, Octavia E. Butler, Ray Bradbury, and Ted Chiang. He enjoys Belgian beers and anything involving laser guns.
Adam McLain is a graduate student in the English department and law student at the School of Law at the University of Connecticut. He studies dystopian literature, legal theory, and sexual justice. They received bachelor’s in English from Brigham Young University, a master’s of theological studies from Harvard University, and a master’s in English from University of Connecticut.
Vivian Zuluaga Papp is a Doctoral Lecturer in the English Department here at City Tech. She has a BA in English from Columbia University, an MA in British and American Literature from Hunter College, and her Ph.D. is in Eighteenth-Century British Literature from Fordham University. Previously, she taught classes in Satire, Women in Science Fiction, Afrofuturism, and Imaginary Travel Narratives while a Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow at Fordham University. Her research interest is in the field of visual epistemology in seventeenth-century scientific texts and early forms of the novel. She is the author of a short science fiction story “Catbot’s in the Cradle,” which was published in Behind the Yellow Wallpaper: New Tales of Madness, and has a chapter coming out in a Science Studies anthology on real and imagined visual manifestations of the “unseeable” in Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year and Robert Boyle’s New Experiments Physico-Mechanicall, Touching the Spring of the Air and Its Effects.
Sarah Pinkser is the author of over sixty works of short fiction, one novella, two novels, and two collections. Her work has won four Nebula Awards (Best Novel, A Song For A New Day; Best Novelette, “Our Lady of the Open Road,” Best Novelette, “Two Truths And A Lie,” Best Short Story, “Where Oaken Hearts Do Gather,”), two Hugo Awards (“Two Truths And a Lie” and “Where Oaken Hearts Do Gather”), the Philip K Dick Award, the Locus Award, the Eugie Foster Award, and the Theodore Sturgeon Award, and been nominated for numerous Nebula, Hugo, Locus, and World Fantasy Awards. Her fiction has been translated into almost a dozen languages and published in magazines including Asimov’s, Strange Horizons, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Uncanny and in many anthologies and year’s bests. Sarah’s first collection, the Philip K Dick Award winning Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea: Stories, was published by Small Beer Press in 2019, and her first novel, A Song For A New Day, was published by Penguin/Random House/Berkley in 2019. Her latest book is We Are Satellites, published in 2021. Her second collection, Lost Places, was published by Small Beer Press in 2023 and was followed by the Tordotcom novella Haunt Sweet Home in September 2024. She is also a singer/songwriter with four albums on various independent labels (the third with her rock band, the Stalking Horses). She lives in Baltimore, Maryland and can be found online at sarahpinsker.com and x.com/sarahpinsker.
Christine Retirado is a Communication Design student at New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Mercurio D. Rivera is a writer whose short fiction has won readers’ awards for Asimov’s and Interzone magazines and has appeared in markets such as The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Lightspeed, i09, Nature, Black Static, and various anthologies, podcasts, and “best of” collections. His novel Wergen: The Alien Love War (published by NewCon Press), which was nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award, tells stories of unrequited love set against the backdrop of humanity’s complicated relationship with an enigmatic alien species. And his Asimov’s story “Beyond the Tattered Veil of Stars,” was podcast by Dust Studios, and features Gillian Jacobs (of Community) and Justin Kirk (of Weeds), and is available anywhere you listen to podcasts.
Justin F. Vázquez-Poritz is the Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at New York College of Technology, CUNY.
Symposium Co-Organizers
This year’s symposium was co-organized by Jill Belli, Wanett Clyde, Jason W. Ellis, Leigh Gold, Kel Karpinski, and Vivian Zuluaga Papp.
Science Fiction Collection
The New York City College of Technology, CUNY (City Tech) holds an extensive collection of genre literature and scholarship focusing primarily on Science Fiction, and secondarily on Mystery and Horror. Inaugurated in 2016 as the City Tech Science Fiction Collection, it contains over 600 linear feet of magazines, anthologies, novels, monographs, and scholarly journals. Thanks to its founding anonymous donor, it features near-complete runs of the major SF magazines. The collection has continued to grow thanks to donations from David Mead, Aaron Barlow, and Charlie Seelig.
The City Tech Science Fiction Collection is held in the Archives and Special Collections of the Ursula C. Schwerin Library. In addition to the collection serving as a locus for an annual symposium on Science Fiction and supplementing student research in City Tech’s ENG2420 Science Fiction course, it is a public collection, so scholars are invited to visit and make use of the collection’s holdings in their research.
Notably, the collection includes a library of texts that contains more than 4,000 science fiction magazine issues from complete or near-complete titles, including Amazing Stories, Astounding/Analog, Fantastic, Future, Galaxy, Galileo, If, Imagination, Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Omni, Spaceway, Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vertex, and Worlds of Tomorrow. An inventory is available at https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/librarycollection/.
To inquire about the collection’s holdings or arrange a visit, contact Collections Management Librarian Wanett Clyde (wclyde@citytech.cuny.edu) and Jason Ellis (jellis@citytech.cuny.edu).
The annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium is held each year in celebration of the collection, which in turn provides the foundation for exploring different themes and issues through interdisciplinary conversations. We have been honored by symposia keynote addresses by Samuel R. Delany, Mike Flynn, Jonathan W. Gray, Ximena Gallardo C. and Ann Matsuuchi, Jeremy Brett, Ytasha L. Womack, and this year, Marleen S. Barr.
Call for Papers: Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, and Generative AI: The Ninth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium
EXTENDED DEADLINE FOR CFP: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2024
Deadline for CFP: Friday, November 8, 2024
Date and Time of Event: Tuesday, December 10, 2024, 9:00AM-5:00PM EST
Location: Academic Building, New York City College of Technology, CUNY
Organizers: Jill Belli, Wanett Clyde, Jason W. Ellis, Leigh Gold, Kel Karpinski, and Vivian Zuluaga Papp
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“Motive,” the construct said. “Real motive problem, with an AI. Not human, see?”
“Well, yeah, obviously.”
“Nope. I mean, it’s not human. And you can’t get a handle on it. Me, I’m not human either, but I respond like one. See?”
“Wait a sec,” Case said. “Are you sentient, or not?”
“Well, it feels like I am, kid, but I’m really just a bunch of ROM. It’s one of them, ah, philosophical questions, I guess …” The ugly laughter sensation rattled down
Case’s spine. “But I ain’t likely to write you no poem, if you follow me. Your AI, it just might. But it ain’t no way human.”
–McCoy “Dixie Flatline” Pauley conversing with Case in William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984)
=====
William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984) captures some of the anxiety today regarding AI. Less like Skynet and its cybernetic soldiers in Terminator (1984), the passage above gets the heart of the subtleties of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that we are now confronting with Generative AI (much like McCoy Pauley’s ROM or read only memory construct) and the pursuit of AGI or Artificial General Intelligence (akin to the novel’s Wintermute and Neuromancer). Various forms and degrees of AI are transforming human culture and relationships in ways both obvious (e.g., ChatGPT) and obscure (e.g., facial recognition, credit scoring, policing, and carceral sentencing). And like Gibson’s imagined future, the megarich of today are developing and deploying AI for their own capitalistic and ideological ends. While their motives are challenging enough to decipher, those of the eventual AGI systems they create will be even more so.
It is with these concerns in mind that we convene this year’s Ninth City Tech Science Fiction Symposium on the topic of Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, and Generative AI. Science Fiction offers a spectrum of AI perspectives from hopeful to warning. On the one hand there is Murray Leinster’s helpful if mischievous “A Logic Named Joe” (1946), but on the other, there is AM in Harlan Ellison’s “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream” (1967). Together, we will examine the many connections between SF and AI: anticipation, caution, education, inspiration, prediction, representation, and more.
We invite proposals for 10-20 minute scholarly paper presentations or 40-60 minute panel discussions related to the topic of Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, and Generative AI. Please send a 250-word abstract with title, brief 100-150-word professional bio, and contact information to Jason Ellis (jellis@citytech.cuny.edu) by Friday, November 8, 2024.
Topics with a connection to Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, and Generative AI might include but certainly are not limited to:
How is AI represented in SF?
What is the history of AI in SF?
Does AI differ in SF across media (e.g., print, film, television, video games, etc.)?
How does AI affect individuals and society in SF?
How does SF approach AI Ethics including and beyond Asimov’s Laws of Robotics?
What are some of the unintended consequences of AI explored in SF, and what might we learn from those?
What are the utopian and dystopian possibilities of AI in SF?
What examples exist of teaching with AI in SF? Are there lessons for pedagogy today?
How does AI’s energy consumption figure into SF and Climate Fiction?
Are there mundane examples of AI in SF?
What can SF teach AI developers and users?
How is Generative AI depicted in SF?
How is Generative AI disrupting SF work practices (e.g., cover and interior art, writing, production workflows, etc.)?
Can AI make SF?
AI? What, me worry?
The event will be held in person at City Tech in downtown Brooklyn, New York.
This event is free and open to the public as space permits: an RSVP will be included with the program when announced on the Science Fiction at City Tech website (https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/). Free registration will be required for participation.
The event is sponsored by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
The Annual City Tech Symposium on Science Fiction is held in celebration of the City Tech Science Fiction Collection, an archival holding of over 600-linear feet of magazines, anthologies, novels, and scholarship. It is in the Archives and Special Collections of the Ursula C. Schwerin Library (Library Building, L543C, New York City College of Technology, 300 Jay Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201). More information about the collection and how to access it is available here: https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/librarycollection/.
I learned from Emily Hockaday today that Mike Flynn, the renowned science fiction writer and keynote speaker for the Fourth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium, has passed away. We were honored to have him join us and share his stories at that year’s symposium celebrating 90 years of Astounding/Analog Science Fiction and Fact. Locus Magazine has an obituary here, and his family’s announcement on Facebook is here.
The Sixth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium on the topic of Access and SF was held on Thursday, Dec. 9, 2021 as a Zoom Webinar. You can read the full program here.
Included below are videos of each session as well as links to expanded presentations .
Many thanks again to everyone who participated and contributed to this year’s event!
Opening
Jason W. Ellis Justin Vazquez-Poritz
Paper Session 1: Access to International SF
Jill Belli – Moderator Emrah Atasoy – “Access to SF in Turkey and Turkish SF Abroad” Shanky Chandra – “Chinese Science Fiction: A Literary Genre, A Tool of Teaching Science or A Secret Weapon of China’s Soft Power?” Gillian Polack – “The Problem of Susan Australia, or, The Tyranny of Distance” | Watch Expanded Presentation
Paper Session 2: Access to Science/Fiction/World
A. Lavelle Porter – Moderator Chris Leslie – “Reevaluating the Inclusiveness of the Interstellar Republic of Letters” Katherine Buse and Anastasia Klimchynskaya – “Science Fiction and Citizen Science” Aaron Zwintscher – “Star Wars Biomes: Simulacra, Nature, and Passivity in No Dialogue Nature Shows”
Discussion Panel: “Accessing the Feminist Science Fiction Archive, Or, Young Women Read Old Feminist SF”
Lisa Yaszek – Moderator Panelists: Josie Benner Olivia Kiklica Jessica Taetle Edeliz Zuleta
Paper Session 3: Access, Inclusion, and Representation in SF
Joy Sanchez-Taylor – Moderator Leigh Gold – “Confronting Language in the Science Fiction Text: Language, Access, and Trauma in Octavia Butler and Ursula K Le Guin” Katherine Pradt – “Shipping Supergirl: Discovering and Defending Lesbian Identity Through a DC Fandom” Sean Scanlan – “Cool Access and Access to Cool: Gibson’s Gun Moll, Dorotea Benedetti” Ida Yoshinaga – “Corporate Employment Practices Towards Greater Diversity of Story Development for SFF Screen Stories”
Paper Session 4: Access, Accessibility, Bodies, and Minds in SF
Lucas Kwong – Moderator Jacob Adler – “‘Everything Herein is Fantastic’: Accessibility and Inclusivity in Dungeons & Dragons” Ryan Collis – “Autistic Speculative Imaginings: Accessing and Creating Minor Literatures” Annette Koh – “Urban Planning for Cyborg Cities: Thinking about disabilities and mobilities in sci-fi as an urban planner”
Analog Writers Panel and the Analog Emerging Black Voices Award
Emily Hockaday – Moderator Panelists Alec Nevala-Lee Marie Vibbert Chelsea Obodoechina Trevor Quachri and Emily Hockaday – Award Presentation
Keynote: “Writing Ourselves In: Teaching Writing and Science Fiction with Wikipedia”
Ximena Gallardo C. and Ann Matsuuchi Wanett Clyde – Introduction and Moderator
Ximena and Ann’s book chapter, “My Books Will Be Read By Millions of People!”: The LaGuardia Community College Octavia E. Butler Wikipedia Project,” that appears in Approaches to Teaching the Works of Octavia Butler, edited by Tarshia Stanley (Modern Language Association, 2019), has been made accessible via the CUNY institutional repository, Academic Works: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/lg_pubs/141/. This book was awarded Idaho State University’s 2021 Teaching Literature Award.
UPDATE: Thank you for the interest and proposals received so far for the upcoming 6th Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium on Access and SF! We want to extend the deadline until Friday, October 29 to give folks an extended window to submit a proposal, especially considering the personal and professional challenges we all continue to face during the on-going pandemic. Details on submitting a proposal are included below in the original CFP. This year’s program will be announced shortly after the new deadline. If you have any questions, please reach out to Jason Ellis (jellis@citytech.cuny.edu) on behalf of the organizing committee.
Call for Papers:
Access and Science Fiction: The Sixth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium
Date and Time:
Thursday, December 9, 2021, 9:00AM-5:00PM EST
Location:
Online, Sponsored by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Organizers:
Jill Belli, Wanett Clyde, Jason W. Ellis, Lucas Kwong, and A. Lavelle Porter
One of the pressing issues that came up during last year’s symposium on Race and Science Fiction (SF) concerned access to the genre in terms of opportunities to create, enjoy, celebrate, identify with, and connect with others. Access, of course, is a shared concern of many historically marginalized and oppressed groups, including women, the disabled, LGBTQ+ persons, and the working class. While it’s obvious that issues of access were an important concern before the pandemic, problems with access were amplified and intensified in startling ways, including: bookstore and library closings expanded and created new book deserts; lockdowns closed off easy access for social interaction, community participation, and mentorship; and reduced access to computers, Internet access, and quiet spaces derailed education and business opportunities for many.
These issues with access before and during the pandemic extend to SF. William Gibson’s aphorism, “The future has arrived–it’s just not evenly distributed yet,” offers a conceptual lens for this. While Gibson’s use of the term “future” equates to the technoscientific, we can substitute SF as representing many imagined futures, and those futures represented by SF are not yet evenly distributed in terms of access to the genre for creators, readers, fans, and critics. Lack of access isn’t only a problem for those who might find enjoyment, meaning, and community through SF in the present; it’s also a potentially long term problem that might affect the types of stories that are produced, what characters get created, and who gets to make them. These different aspects of access and SF were of importance when we met last year, but they are even more so now for all affected SF creators, fans, and scholars concerned about what the shape of things to come will be for access and SF.
The Sixth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium aims to explore the broad theme of “Access and SF” as a way to understand the relationship between access and SF, identify what’s at stake and for whom, foster alliances between those fighting for access, and discuss how improving access for some improves access for all.
Also, Analog Science Fiction and Fact will announce the winner of their inaugural Analog Award for Emerging Black Voices at this year’s symposium (https://www.analogsf.com/about-analog/analog-emerging-black-voices-award/).
We invite proposals for 10-20 minute scholarly paper presentations or 40-60 minute panel discussions related to the topic of Access and SF. Please send a 250-word abstract with title, brief 100-150-word professional bio, and contact information to Jason Ellis (jellis@citytech.cuny.edu) by Friday, October 29, 2021October 15, 2021. Topics with a connection to Access and SF might include but certainly are not limited to:
Access to Science Fiction for an Audience (reading text, watching films, playing video games, listening to music, etc.)
Access to Science Fiction as a Fan (fandom, community, blogging, vlogging, cons, online, etc.)
Access to Science Fiction as a Creator (writing, directing, developing, composing, etc.)
Access to Science Fiction as a Scholar (special collections, research, teaching with distance learning)
Access to Science Fiction where Roles Collide (navigating access through different relationships to the genre)
Barriers to Access of Science Fiction for an Audience (knowledge, technology, sources, mentors, etc.)
Barriers to Access to Science Fiction as a Creator (biases, racism, sexism, traditional gatekeepers, etc.)
Accessibility, Disability, and Science Fiction (direct access, indirect access, etc.)
Technologies of Access and Accessibility that Relate to SF (applied to creation, consumption, community, criticism, etc.)
Access, Openness, and SF (Digital Humanities, Wikipedia, open source and free software, Fair Use and Copyright, open pedagogy, etc.)
Affinity Politics and Intersectionality Between and Among Groups Working Toward Improved Access to SF
Like last year’s symposium (https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWEFb3DcsZdnyQCpNM4jY4uX_wlmO1sTt), the on-going pandemic necessitates holding this year’s event online, too. Therefore, there are no geographical limitations for participants, but the time for the event’s program will follow Eastern Standard Time (UTC-5:00)
This event is free and open to the public as space permits: an RSVP will be included with the program when announced on the Science Fiction at City Tech website (https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/). Free registration will be required for participation.
The event is sponsored by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
The Annual City Tech Symposium on Science Fiction is held in celebration of the City Tech Science Fiction Collection, an archival holding of over 600-linear feet of magazines, anthologies, novels, and scholarship. It is in the Archives and Special Collections of the Ursula C. Schwerin Library (Library Building, L543C, New York City College of Technology, 300 Jay Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201). More information about the collection and how to access it is available here: https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/librarycollection/.
Race and Science Fiction: The Fifth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium
Date and Time: November 19, 2020, 9:00AM-5:00PM
Location: Online, Sponsored by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Organizers: Wanett Clyde, Jason W. Ellis, and A. Lavelle Porter
“People who say change is impossible are usually pretty happy with things just as they are.” –N. K. Jemisin, The City We Became
Science Fiction, on a fundamental level, is always about the here-and-now in which it is produced, because it is from that point the author extrapolates an imagined future or alternate reality. The long and hard fight for civil rights and the latest unfolding of that struggle in the Black Lives Matter movement and its alliances calls on us to recognize the powerful possibilities within Science Fiction to imagine change, especially those promoting social justice and equality by writers of color and Afrofuturists, as well as reckon with the field’s patterns of racism, resistance to inclusion, and lack of representation.
The Fifth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium aims to explore the possibilities for change through the myriad connections between Race and Science Fiction with scholarly presentations, readings by authors, and engaging discussion. It is our goal to foster conversations that question, critique, or discuss SF as it relates to Race.
We invite proposals for 10-20 minute scholarly paper presentations, panel discussions, or author readings related to the topic of race and Science Fiction. Please send a 250-word abstract with title, brief professional bio, and contact information to Jason Ellis (jellis@citytech.cuny.edu) by September 30, 2020. Topics with a connection to race and Science Fiction might include but are certainly not limited to:
Histories of race and Science Fiction.
Representation of race in Science Fiction.
Representation of writers of color in the Science Fiction field.
Inclusion or exclusion of readers and fans due to race.
Issues of identity, including race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, culture, etc.
Subgenres and movements, such as Afrofuturism, Black science fiction, Indigenous Futurism, and speculative fiction by writers of color.
Race, Science Fiction, and Music, such as Sun Ra, George Clinton, Janelle Monáe, and Outkast.
Race and Comic Books
Engagement with civil rights movements in Science Fiction explicitly or metaphorically.
Pedagogical approaches to teaching race and Science Fiction or teaching about race with Science Fiction.
Due to the uncertainty in the months ahead, the symposium will be held online using a combination of pre-recorded video lectures hosted on the web and real-time interactive discussion on the scheduled day of the symposium using widely available video conferencing software.
This event is free and open to the public as space permits: an RSVP will be included with the program when announced on the Science Fiction at City Tech website (https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/). Free registration will be required for participation.
The event is sponsored by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
The Annual City Tech Symposium on Science Fiction is held in celebration of the City Tech Science Fiction Collection, an archival holding of over 600-linear feet of magazines, anthologies, novels, and scholarship. It is in the Archives and Special Collections of the Ursula C. Schwerin Library (Library Building, L543C, New York City College of Technology, 300 Jay Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201). More information about the collection and how to access it is available here: https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/sciencefictionatcitytech/librarycollection/.
It was a great success! We had over 100 attendees comprised of scholars, writers, editors, fans, and City Tech students and faculty. The partnership between Analog Science Fiction and Fact and City Tech helped the event grow and reach new audiences, and the combination of scholarly presentations, an editors’ roundtable, and writers events–a writers’ roundtable and the keynote by SF writer Mike Flynn made the event speak in powerful and engaging ways to the many different attendees.
For folks who couldn’t make it to the symposium, we’re carrying on the conversation asynchronously online by making videos of each session and Q&A available on YouTube. Wherever you might talk about the symposium, please use these hashtags to help us engage and track the ongoing discussion: #CityTechSF and #AnalogSF90th.
Julie Bradford, a Graphic Design Intern in City Tech’s Faculty Commons, designed the posters for this year’s and last year’s Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium. Prof. Jason Ellis asked her the following questions about the process and tools that she uses to create her art, and he asked her about her relationship to Science Fiction in general.
(1) Julie, you designed the posters for the third and fourth City Tech Science Fiction Symposia. Considering the Frankenstein-themed poster for last year’s symposium, what inspired you to make the poster artwork for the third symposium? What was your design process like to create this poster recognizing the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley’s groundbreaking novel?
The Third Annual City Tech Symposium on Science Fiction poster designed by Julie Bradford.
The main inspiration came from wanting to present a scene everyone familiar with Dr. Frankenstein’s monster know about: the moment he comes to life. I spent some time analyzing the good Doctor’s lab from the 1931 film and sketching up a few designs that would best convey the scene. I wanted to use as few colors as possible with a dark overtone to really set that feeling of terror.
(2) This year, you designed a very different kind of poster for the 4th Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium celebrating the 90th anniversary of Analog Science Fiction and Fact magazine. What inspired you to design this poster? What was your design process like on this poster? Did this poster encourage your development as an artist, and if so, how? What, if any, movies, video games, music, or stories provide you with ideas that you incorporated and transformed into this poster?
I had ZERO ideas even though I was excited to design another poster for an anniversary event! All I knew was wanting the poster to resemble an Analog cover. The concept ideas didn’t start to formulate until after I received all the Analog references from you. After reading a few of the provided works, mocking up a few designs and going back-and-forth with you, the final concept came through— which is what we see now! This poster was very different from what I made for last year’s symposium, and even my own current works. The concept pushed me to try new things, one of them was to tell a visual story in one go, no panels with dialogue to help.
The Fourth City Tech Science Fiction Symposium Poster by Julie Bradford.
(3) More generally, what is your design workflow? From generating ideas to drafting to finalizing, how do you create your art and what tools do you use?
First is always the research, from any physical to digital items, movies, shows, written works, etc. What helps the most is talking the idea over with others, especially those who asked for the poster be made. I start off with analog tools: pencil and paper. Once the sketch is approved and solid, I move onto digital with my trusty iPad and the Procreate app. Once the illustration is complete, I import it over to Illustrator where the overall design has been laid out.
(4) Turning to thinking about your relationship to the tools that you use as an artist, do you think of yourself as a cyborg–a being whose existence is mediated by technology? How about being a cyborg in a larger sense thanks to modern digital technologies, such as smartphones, email, social media, streaming, etc.?
Funnily enough, I was thinking of this concept recently about how dependent I am on my digital tools, from my tablet to my desktop to even my video game consoles. There was once a time when I needed none of that but now I can’t imagine going a day without using them. I do not think of myself as a cyborg per se— at least not like Cyborg from DC comics. Perhaps more of a cyborg-lite?
(5) Finally, as a science fiction fan, what do you recommend folks check out? It can be anything SF-related: movies, video games, tv shows, literature, music, apps, etc.
BLACK MIRROR! And the original Twilight Zone. Classics are classics for a reason!
Julie Bradford is a BFA in Communication Design Management student at City Tech who has a strong background in illustration. When she is not distracted by cute and shiny things or busy drawing up comic adventures with her Pokemon Go buddies, she is focused on her schoolwork and catching up on her shows. While completing her BFA, she is working as a graphic design intern for City Tech’s Faculty Commons. See her in-progress work online here: https://www.instagram.com/_saltyjules/.
If you’re planning to attend this year’s symposium–and we hope that you all are: students, faculty, scholars, and the public–please RSVP by filling out this very short form. This is helps us plan the best symposium possible for you!
Fourth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium Poster by Julie Bradford.
An Astounding 90 Years of Analog Science Fiction and Fact
The Fourth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium
Thursday, Dec. 12, 2019, 9:00AM-6:00PM
New York City College of Technology, 285 Jay St., A105, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Organized by Jason W. Ellis (City Tech) and Emily Hockaday (Analog Science Fiction and Fact)
Held in partnership with Analog Science Fiction and Fact and its publisher Penny Publications.
Hosted by the School of Arts and Sciences at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY.
Event hashtags: #CityTechSF and #AnalogSF90th
Analog Science Fiction and Fact began its storied history 90 years ago as one of the most important and influential SF magazines with the publication of its first issue under the title Astounding Stories of Super-Science. During that time, its fabled editors, award-winning writers, recognized artists, and invested readers played roles in the development of one of the longest running and renowned SF magazines, which in turn, influenced the field and adapted to change.
The Fourth Annual City Tech Science Fiction Symposium celebrates “An Astounding 90 Years of Analog Science Fiction and Fact.” Bringing together SF writers, scholars, and fans, the conversations today will reflect on the past, comment on the present, and contemplate the future of Analog SF. Linked to these discussions is the role of SF in a college of technology that recognizes the importance of the genre through its Science Fiction class and support for the City Tech Science Fiction Collection, an archival holding of over 600-linear feet of magazines, anthologies, novels, and scholarship. Together, we will explore these connections.
Schedule
9:00am-9:20am
Breakfast and Opening Remarks
Justin Vazquez-Poritz, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, New York City College of Technology
Jason W. Ellis, Assistant Professor of English, New York City College of Technology
9:20am-10:00am
Teaching with SF Collections
Moderator: Lucas Kwong
Jason W. Ellis, “Introduction to the City Tech Science Fiction Collection”
Zachary Lloyd, “Interdisciplinary Approaches to Teaching with Science Fiction”
10:00am-10:10am
Break
10:10am-11:00am
Editors Panel
Moderator: Frank Wu
Panelists: Stanley Schmidt
Trevor Quachri
Emily Hockaday
11:00am-11:10am
Break
11:10am-12:40pm
Marginalized Voices and Feminist Futures
Moderator: Lisa Yaszek
Marleen Barr, “Rachel Rodman’s “The Evolutionary Alice” As Fractured Feminist Fantasy”
Adam McLain, “Visualizing Gendered Voice in Ninety Years of Astounding and Analog”
Marie Vibbert, “Visible Women in Astounding and Analog”
12:40pm-1:40pm
Lunch
1:40pm-3:10pm
Writers Panel
Moderator: Emily Hockaday
Panelists: Phoebe Barton
Leah Cypess
Jay Werkheiser
Alison Wilgus
Frank Wu
3:10pm-3:20pm
Break
3:20pm-4:50pm
Critical Issues in Analog SF
Moderator: Lavelle A. Porter
Sharon Packer, “Simian Cinema, Darwinian Debates, and Early Analog SF Stories”
Stanley Schmidt, “Humor in Analog”
Edward Wysocki, Jr., “Just the Facts: Articles in Campbell’s Astounding and Analog”
4:50pm-5:00pm
Break
5:00pm-6:00pm
Keynote Address by Mike Flynn
Introduction: Trevor Quachri
Symposium Participants
Symposium Participants
Marleen S. Barr is known for her pioneering work in feminist science fiction and teaches English at the City University of New York. She has won the Science Fiction Research Association Pilgrim Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction criticism. Barr is the author of Alien to Femininity: Speculative Fiction and Feminist Theory, Lost in Space: Probing Feminist Science Fiction and Beyond, Feminist Fabulation: Space/Postmodern Fiction, and Genre Fission: A New Discourse Practice for Cultural Studies. Barr has edited many anthologies and co-edited the science fiction issue of PMLA. She is the author of the novels Oy Pioneer! and Oy Feminist Planets: A Fake Memoir. Her latest publication is When Trump Changed, the first single authored short story collection about Trump.
Phoebe Barton is a queer trans science fiction writer. Her short fiction has appeared in venues such as Analog, On Spec, and anthologies from Bundoran Press and Alliteration Ink. She is currently writing the interactive fiction game The Tunnel Crew for Choice of Games.
She lives with a robot in the sky above Toronto and is represented by Kim-Mei Kirtland at Howard Morhaim Literary Agency. She serves as an Associate Editor at Escape Pod, and she is a 2019 graduate of the Clarion West Writers Workshop.
Julie Bradford designed the third and fourth City Tech Science Fiction Symposium poster and program cover. She is a BFA in Communication Design Management student at City Tech who has a strong background in illustration. When she is not distracted by cute and shiny things or busy drawing up comic adventures with her Pokemon Go buddies, she is focused on her schoolwork and catching up on her shows. While completing her BFA, she is working as a graphic design intern for City Tech’s Faculty Commons. See her in-progress work online here: https://www.instagram.com/_saltyjules/.
Leah Cypess sold her first story while in high school, then gave in to her mother’s importuning to be practical and studied biology and law. However, she is now a full-time writer with numerous published short stories, including two published in Analog this year. She is also the author of four young adult fantasy novels, including Mistwood and Death Sworn. Leah grew up in Brooklyn, NY, and has since lived in Boston and in the D.C. area. You can find out more about her writing and her other interests at her website, www.leahcypess.com, as well as on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Jason W. Ellis is an Assistant Professor of English at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY. He holds a Ph.D. in English from Kent State University, M.A. in Science Fiction Studies from the University of Liverpool, and B.S. in Science, Technology, and Culture from Georgia Tech. Most recently, he talked with Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson about the relationship between SF and society on StarTalk Radio.
Michael F. Flynn debuted in Analog with “Slan Libh” (11/84) and has contributed regularly ever since. His stories have been nominated for the Hugo Award seven times, most recently for “The Journeyman: In the Stone House” and won the Theodore Sturgeon Award for “House of Dreams.” He won the first Robert A. Heinlein medal for his body of work. His twelve novels include the four-volume FIRESTAR series and the four-volume SPIRAL ARM series as well as the Hugo-nominated Eifelheim and the critically-acclaimed The Wreck of “The River of Stars”. His third collection, Captive Dreams, includes three Analog stories and three new stories written for the collection. He is currently working on The Journeyman, a picaresque novel, and The Shipwrecks of Time, set in the alien world of 1965 Milwaukee.
Emily Hockaday is the managing editor of Analog Science Fiction and Fact and Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine. She coedited, with Jackie Sherbow, the horror anthology Terror at the Crossroads: Tales of Horror, Delusion, and the Unknown. She is author of five poetry chapbooks including Space on Earth, What We Love & Will Not Give Up, and the forthcoming Beach Vocabulary. Find out more about her at www.emilyhockaday.com or on twitter @E_Hockaday.
Lucas Kwong is an assistant professor of English at New York City College of Technology. His scholarship on fantastic fiction, religion, and colonialism has been published in Victorian Literature and Culture, Religion and Literature, and Journal of Narrative Theory. He also serves as the assistant editor for New American Notes Online, an online interdisciplinary scholarly journal, and as editor for City Tech Writer, a journal of student writing. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife.
Zachary Lloyd has completed an MA in philosophy from The New School for Social Research and is currently a PhD student in comparative literature at CUNY Graduate Center. He is an adjunct instructor in the English department at Brooklyn College.
Adam McLain is a Master of Theological Studies candidate at Harvard Divinity School. He studies the intersection of gender, sexuality, theology, and literature, with an emphasis on questions of identity and temporality. At Brigham Young University, his undergraduate, he served for three years as managing editor of the award-winning science fiction and fantasy magazine, Leading Edge, and he has presented papers at Life, the University, and Everything; International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts; the International Congress on Medieval Studies; North American Science Fiction Association conference; the Society for Utopian Studies; and the Science Fiction Research Association conference.
Sharon Packer, M.D., is a Mount Sinai-affiliated psychiatrist who is in private practice in New York and is the author of many journal articles, books chapters, and several academic books, including Neuroscience in Science Fiction Film; Cinema’s Sinister Psychiatrists; Superheroes and Superegos: The Minds behind the Masks; Movies and the Modern Psyche; Dreams in Myth, Medicine and Movies. She edited Mental Illness in Popular Culture; Evil in American Popular Culture; and the forthcoming Welcome to Arkham Asylum.
Trevor Quachri, who took the reins of Analog Science Fiction and Fact as editor in 2012, started off as an editorial assistant in 1999 and worked his way up the ladder at Analog and Asimov’s Science Fiction, under Stanley Schmidt, Sheila Williams, and Gardner Dozois, respectively. On top of that, he’s also been a Broadway stagehand, collected data for museums, and executive produced a science fiction pilot for a basic cable channel. He lives in New Jersey with his fiancée, daughter, and way, way too many comic books.
Stanley Schmidt (PhD, Physics) was the editor of Analog for a long time (34 years!) and enjoys writing for it just as much now as he did before he became editor in 1978. His recent contributions include the serialized novel Night Ride and Sunrise (now available from FoxAcre Press), and stories, articles, and guest editorials of various shapes and sizes. A small selection of Dr. Schmidt’s many accolades and accomplishments include the Hugo Award for Best Editor: Short Form, the SFWA Solstice Award, and the Robert A. Heinlein Award given for outstanding published works in science fiction and technical writings that inspire the human exploration of space. When not reading Analog just for fun, Dr. Schmidt can be found hiking, traveling, and playing various sorts of music. Find more information about Stanley Schmidt on his website: https://sfwa.org/members/stanleyschmdit.
Justin Vazquez-Poritz is the Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences and Professor of Physics at the New York City College of Technology.
Marie Vibbert has had six stories in Analog Science Fiction, as well as selling stories to other top markets such as Fantasy and Science Fiction and Lightspeed. She is the lead programmer for digital libraries at Kelvin Smith Library at Case Western Reserve University. Her monograph on the headdresses of the fifteenth century in northern Europe has been cited on Wikipedia.
Jay Werkheiser teaches chemistry and physics. Pretty much all the time. His stories are sneaky devices to allow him to talk about science in a (sort of) socially acceptable way. Much to his surprise, the editors of Analog and various other magazines, e-zines, and anthologies have found a few of his stories worth publishing. Many of those story ideas came from nerdy discussions with his daughter or his students. He really should keep an updated blog and author page, but he mostly wastes his online time on Facebook, MeWe, or Twitter (@JayWerkheiser).
Alison Wilgus is a Brooklyn-based writer, editor and cartoonist who primarily works in comics, but her interest in short fiction lead her to attend both Clarion West and Launchpad, and her stories have appeared in venues such as Analog, Interzone, and Strange Horizons. In her spare time Alison and her co-host, Gina Gagliano, make “Graphic Novel TK,” a podcast about the nuts and bolts of graphic novel publishing. Alison’s latest work is Chronin, a duology of historical SF graphic novels, published by Tor books. You can find her on Twitter and Instagram as @aliwilgus.
Frank Wu is a transdimensional interspace being, living physically near Boston with his wife Brianna the Magnificent, but regularly projecting his mind across time and space to commune with dinosaurs, eurypterids, and numinous energy beings. Visualizations and written accounts of these journeys can be found in Analog, Amazing Stories, Realms of Fantasy, frankwu.com, and the radiation-hardened memory bunkers of planet Gorsplax.
Edward M. Wysocki, Jr. holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University (1978). He is now retired after more than 30 years with Martin Marietta/Lockheed Martin. He is a Charter Member of The Heinlein Society and a member of the Science Fiction Research Association. He has published various short articles and notes in The Heinlein Journal and Science Fiction Studies; the book chapter, “The Creation of Heinlein’s ‘Solution Unsatisfactory’” In Practicing Science Fiction: Critical Essays on Writing, Reading and Teaching the Genre. Eds. Karen Hellekson et al. (2010); and three self-published books: The Great Heinlein Mystery: Science Fiction, Innovation and Naval Technology (2012), An ASTOUNDING War: Science Fiction and World War II (2015), and Out of This World Ideas: And the Inventions They Inspired (2018).
Lisa Yaszek is Professor of Science Fiction Studies in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech, where she researches and teaches science fiction as a global language crossing centuries, continents, and cultures. She is particularly interested in issues of gender, race, and science and technology in science fiction across media as well as the recovery of lost voices in science fiction history and the discovery of new voices from around the globe. Yaszek’s books include The Self-Wired: Technology and Subjectivity in Contemporary American Narrative (Routledge 2002/2014); Galactic Suburbia: Recovering Women’s Science Fiction (Ohio State, 2008); and Sisters of Tomorrow: The First Women of Science Fiction (Wesleyan 2016). Her ideas about science fiction as the premiere story form of modernity have been featured in The Washington Post, Food and Wine Magazine, and USA Today and on the AMC miniseries, James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction. A past president of the Science Fiction Research Association, Yaszek currently serves as an editor for the Library of America and as a juror for the John W. Campbell and Eugie Foster Science Fiction Awards.
