Hello, I thought this might be the ideal forum to ask for a little
help on an academic project I'm working on. we can either discuss it
on the list, or you can e-mail me in person at laidlojm@m4-
arts.bham.ac.uk
I'm a grad student in the dept. of english at the University of
Birmingham in England. I teach other people's courses to make ends
meet, but a friend and I have the chance to construct a ten week
course in science fiction to run as one of the future modules for the
BA degree here. The only catch is that as I supposedly finish my
thesis and get a real job by the next academic year (Sept. 98) the
course will probably not be taught by me. Still, as I have the
greater knowledge, and a little more time, I'm putting together the
course and bibliographies etc for my friend.
Where I want your help is that we have ten weeks to survey
British and American SF and I'm putting together a syllabus that
bears in mind the following problems:
availability of texts in UK
canonical (ie 'classics of SF') texts versus more entertaining texts
(well, 'classics' versus more popular/populist SF novels/
male and female (my colleague works in feminist studies and would
like quite a few female authors on the list).
Here's my preliminary list, followed by some suggestions of what I'd
like to do with the course. In no real order.
1. War of the Worlds and the Time Machine
2. Foundation trilogy
3. Dune by Frank Herbert
4. Princess of Mars by ER Burroughs, with MARtian Chronicles by
Bradbury
5. Man in the High Castle and Ubik by PK Dick
6. Left Hand of Darkness by le Guin and Handmaid's Tale by Atwood.
7. Starship Troopers (Heinlein) and Forever War by Haldeman
8. Anne McCaffey, probably Dragonflight or Ship who Sang. I know her
work is more fantasy than SF
9. Cyberpunk - short stories by STerling and Gibson and Cadigan
10. British SF - Stapledon or Ballard or Moorcock.
This is merely a preliminary list reflecting some of the things we'd
want to teach, and sometimes I've listed two texts where we'd end up
only reading one. I'm conscious that this list doesn't adequately
capture over a hundred years of SF, nor does it include enough women
authors to really do what my colleague wants with it yet. I'd
probably want to do Olaf Stapledon, but the texts are hard to get
hold of for groups of students. It also excludes lots of recent work,
and many of my favourite authors like Gene Wolfe, Lucius Shepard,
Edmond Hamilton, C J Cherryh.
What I want from you are your thoughts, comments, advice on my list,
and perhaps your own lists on how to cover Science Fiction to 2nd and
3rd year degree students who may have no experience of SF beyond Star
Wars, and how to do the subject justice.
I hope you can help.
Jonathan Laidlow
School of English
University of Birmingham, UK.
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