Eng. 215: Reading Science Fiction & Fantasy

May 2025 Theme: Monsters and Aliens!

We'll read a variety of mostly recent SF  and a couple of Fantasy pieces, nearly all short stories, exploring what the strange "other" means to writers of speculative fiction. We will ponder how writers address some of these questions, and then have you try your hand at it:

1. What makes something or someone "monstrous"?  

2. Who are aliens? What does it mean when a human plays that role?

3. How do humans respond to learning that life is not all about us?

4. When can a machine act like "one of us"? How does a machine come to know / do evil?

Class goals for General Education Curriculum (Writing Communication, Literary Study, Literay & Textual Inquiry)

• 1. Explore how writers use metaphor and dialog to convey ideas to readers

  2. Place two works in conversation about a common idea

  3. Move student writers beyond mere summary to deeper analysis of texts

  4. Practice the language of literary analysis, close reading, and podcasting with two projects, written in multiple steps and with some application of generative AI each each 

Texts For May Term, 2025

• Hartwell, D. and Hayden, P., Eds. 21st Century Science Fiction: an Anthology (buy the Kindle Edition)

• Other readings are linked from the syllabus or will be provided by me

• You may need to pay $5 for a subscription to Eleven Lab's software for the podcast assignment, if you use up your free-account credits.