2024-2025 Academic Catalog

Nov 16, 2024

2024-2025 Academic Catalog

ENG 115 - Speculative Fiction

Speculative fiction (more popularly known as science fiction) entertains the “what if” and presents alternative conceptions of history, society, and identity. Committed to exploring the possibilities and limitations of the alternative and the different, these works interrogate established boundaries of identities and provide critical perspectives on prevailing beliefs and ideologies. The course moves chronologically through works that fall loosely under the speculative fiction subgenres of fantasy/horror, alternative histories, future dystopias, and political allegories. We will also devote some attention to formal analysis, specifically the ways in which speculative fiction narratives experiment with and break from traditional literary conventions to offer new ways of perceiving, constructing, and deconstructing our social realities. Authors include Mary Shelley, H. P. Lovecraft, H.G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Ursula Le Guin, Octavia E. Butler, William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Ted Chiang. For English majors, this course satisfies the C-2 requirement.

Prerequisites: Writing placement or IDND 018

Course Designation/Attribute: VE, WE

Anticipated Terms Offered: Periodically