Instructors:
Overview:
The term "science fiction" is a misnomer in that it is generally not fiction about science. The genre is more appropriately titled "speculative fiction", since authors are free to speculate about what-might-have-beens, and what-ifs, and what-might-be. When these speculations are carried out subject to the constraints of physical law, we have what is called hard Science Fiction (as opposed to fantasy). This course will examine some of these what-might-have-beens, and what-ifs, and what-might-bes subject to the constraints of physical law.
We will us this genre of literature
We will read 8 hard SF novels, a number of novellas and short stories, and two works of non-fiction about the relevant speculative science. We will examine these texts through the lenses of both science and literature. Please note that all texts under our microscope are "hard sci-fi," so what we find could be possible...
Prerequisites: Students must have completed the DEC A and B requirements and have passed one DEC E course.
Requirements:
Your critique (paper a.) must be on material that is approved by the instructors (we can't have you reading fantasy now, or critiquing "Lost in Space" or "Barbarella", can we?), or is based on material in the following list of other texts.
The topic for paper b.) is to be chosen from one of the following:
Readings: The required texts, which you must purchase, are
The required texts which are available on-line are linked in the syllabus
Movie Nights:
The goal of this course is to read these works of literature
and discuss the ideas and themes they evoke. Some of these works have
been translated to the big screen, with varying degrees of faithfulness to
the books. Because the visual media offer a very different way of presenting
these ideas, we will show a few movies (mostly excerpts) in class.
As an experiment, we will offer a series of Movie Nights to supplement
the readings.
These Movie Nights are optional. Attendance will not be taken (Indeed, the room is too small to accomodate all of you!). Because you have full schedules, we will rotate these nights through the week. The tentative schedule is listed here. Movies will be shown in ESS 450 at 7:00 PM. Guests are welcome on a space-available basis.
We will follow each movie with a short discussion of the relevance of the movie to the themes being discussed in class.
Contacting the Instructors:
The instructors welcome e-mail, but are innundated with spam. And many of you
have e-mail addresses that are not instantly recognizable, especially if they
originate from yahoo.com or hotmail.com.
Please make sure that the subject line of your e-mail contains one of the
following phrases: AST 389, EGL 389, or
Science Fiction.
Assigned papers may be mailed as attachments, but please send copies to both instructors, and ask for a confirmation that we can read your file. PDF, postscript, and Word (.doc or .rtf) documents are generally readable, but there are alien formats (such as xml) we simply cannot fathom. If you have a choice, pdf is preferable.
Classroom Decorum:
Students attending class are asked to exhibit common courtesy.
Students are encouraged to ask questions at any time during the lectures. Lecture notes will not be available, although lecture synopses may be posted to the course website. You are responsible for taking notes.
Attendance Policy :
Students who know in advance that they will miss a class because
of university-related activities (including athletics) or civic obligations
(e.g., jury duty) should contact the
instructors as soon as possible in advance of the date of absence.
Otherwise, one unexcused absence is allowed; each subsequent absence will lower your grade. An excused absence is documented immediately after it occurs -- advance notice of a necessary absence is also a good thing! Attendance will be taken.
An absence, excused or not, is not sufficient reason to be late with papers.
Requests for extra credit assignments will not be entertained.
Academic Dishonesty :
Plagiarism is bad. Always give credit to all your sources.
Students suspected of plagiarizing their writing assignments, or of any other form of academic dishonesty, will be assigned an F grade for the course and will be reported to the academic judiciary.
Students who suspect others of cheating are encouraged to report them. Reports will be kept confidential. Dishonest students make things that much harder for the majority of students, who are honest.
SBU subscribes to a plagiarism-detection website, and it is really easy for instructors to use. Moreover, the time spent searching for lovely things to plagiarize is arguably longer than what it will take to craft a personal paper. Again, please don't!