Critical Race & Ethnic Studies: Af Am Sci Fi/Fantasy (A)

About CRES 1825 A

Representative topic: African-American Women Writers in the Twentieth- and Twenty-first Centuries. May be repeated for credit with different content. Topics vary by offering; periodic offering at intervals that may exceed four years. Cross-listed with: ENGL 1220.

Notes

Open to degree and PACE students. Cross listed with ENGL 1220A; total combined enrollment = 40

Section Description

Course Description
We’ll start by considering that “race” (as a meaningful biological category, especially in the service of racial hierarchies) constitutes one of the most pernicious science fictions of recent human history. Pseudo-scientific narratives establishing fundamental, socially meaningful differences among “races” have rationalized slavery, segregation, and many other forms of oppression. It’s no surprise, then, that writers of science fiction and fantasy (often collectively labeled “speculative fiction” or “sf” these days) have been well-positioned to challenge racism and to expose its effects.

The works we’ll read will frequently challenge basic assumptions about race (and class and gender), but they’ll also push us to read in new ways. Speculative Fiction challenges readers through shocks to the imagination as we’re invited to view our societies radically transformed and our texts playing by new rules. We’ll spend some of our time orienting ourselves in the new worlds and their new rules (which have implications in terms of social and literary models). As diverse readers ourselves, some of us may come to these texts with a background in fantasy, science fiction, dystopian narratives and the like; others will be new to these genres. Those with familiarity can teach us to see these texts through the eyes of experience; those who are new to this sort of work will teach us to see things we haven’t noticed yet!

This is a low or no AI class. I will not be using AI for any part of the content creation, lecture prep, responding or evaluating. I will require students to do their own reading and interpreting, their own idea-generating, their own drafting, and their own polishing of their writing. In other words, we won't be offloading any of the cognitive labor onto text extrusion machines; they'll have to get their data elsewhere. We will discuss the role of AI in our current environment (academic and social), and we may scrutinize some AI-generated material in class together, but AI use for creative and intellectual work will be prohibited.

Course Materials
The following books will be required. Additional texts will be made available in the Bb space.
1. Friday Black, by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Publisher: Mariner Books: ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎1328911241; ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1328911247
2. Aye, Gomorrah, and Other Stories, by Samuel R. Delaney; Publisher: Vintage ISBN-10: 0375706712; ISBN-13: 978-0375706714
3. Parable of the Sower, by Octavia Butler; Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1538732181; ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1538732182
4.Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora, edited by Sheree R. Thomas; Publisher: Aspect (Warner Books) ISBN-10: 0446677248; ISBN-13: 978-0446677240
5. How Long Until Black Future Month? by N. K. Jemisin; Publisher: Orbit ISBN-10 :‎0316491373; ISBN-13‏: ‎ 978-0316491372

Section Expectation

Students will be expected to attend class, complete readings in an active and timely way, participate in class discussion, draft short written homework responses and short essays, and complete a final project (such as a "deep dive" essay, a radio play/essay project, a visual arts/essay project, or a creative imitation/essay project).

Evaluation

Your primary assessments will be in participation, written homework responses, and draft essay projects.

Important Dates

Note: These dates may change before registration begins.

Courses may be cancelled due to low enrollment. Show your interest by enrolling.

Resources

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