Assignments

Critical Essay & Question Presentation -- You will be a required to sign up in small groups for an oral presentation during the course of the quarter. For your presentation, you will read the literary text assigned for a particular week, articulate one or two main points from the week’s scholarly text (as assigned), generate a critical question or two connecting the two, and get class discussion started for the day. A short single-spaced half-sheet or 1-page handout copied for the whole class is encouraged. Presentations are no more than 10 minutes, may include media, and each presenter must have a substantive speaking part.

In-Class Quizzes -- There will be five or more in-class quizzes at various times during the quarter. These quizzes serve as a review of the week’s main ideas, terms, texts, and readings. These quizzes will include identifications, fill-in-the-blanks, definitions, and short answers.

Exams (40%) -- You will have three take-home exam opportunities, which will consist of short answer and essay questions. Exams will be due at the end of Week 4 (Exam I), Week 8 (Exam II), and Week 11 (Exam III). You must complete two of the three exams. Exams will be cumulative and based on the class readings, literature, other media, and in-class and Canvas discussions.

Queering Dystopia Critical Review -- a 500-600 word analytical review of a text you would think could be or should be included in our class. You must have your text approved by the instructor before completing the assignment. Critical Reviews are due by the last day of instruction and will be posted to the class blog.

Information Sheets

The following are handouts, informational sheets, and readings that will be assigned or used over the course of the quarter. Each student will recieve a copy of each as a handout in class during the appropriate week. If you miss a sheet, feel free to print out a new copy.

Ed's Top Ten List of "Ways to Survive University"

Ed's Top Ten Rules of Writing

Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing

MLA Citation and Bibliographic Format

What is Close Reading?

Readings

Course texts are available via the UO Duck Store (or through any reputable bookseller). Course readers are available only via the Duck Store or Campus Copy. The required texts for this class are:

WGS 352 Course Reader (Spring 2017). Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale. Butler, Octavia. Dawn. Lai, Larissa. Salt Fish Girl. Butler, Duffy, & Jennings, Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation.

Consult the course syllabus for each week's required reading. The following is a full bibliographical list of the class readings:

Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid's Tale. New York: Anchor Books, 1998. Baccolini, Raffaella and Tom Moylan. "Introduction: Dystopia and Histories." Dark Horizons: Science Fiction and the Dystopian Imagination. Eds. Raffaella Baccolini and Tom Moylan. New York: Routledge, 2003. 1-12. ---. "Conclusion: Critical Dystopia and Possibilities." Dark Horizons: Science Fiction and the Dystopian Imagination. Eds. Raffaella Baccolini and Tom Moylan. New York: Routledge, 2003. 233-249. Berlant, Lauren. "Citizenship." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 37-42. Butler, Octavia. "Dawn." Lilith's Brood. New York: Warner Books, 1989. 1-248. Butler, Octavia, Damian Duffy, and John Jennings. Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation. New York: Abrams, 2017. Chiang, Ted. "Story of Your Life." Stories of Your Life and Others. New York: Vintage, 2002. 91-146. Delany, Samuel. "Aye, and Gomorrah..." Aye, and Gomorrah and Other Stories. New York: Vintage, 1991. 91-101. Du Bois, W.E.B. "The Comet." Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora. Ed. Sheree R. Thomas. New York: Aspect, 2000. 5-18. Ferguson, Robert A. "Race." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 191-196. Frost, "The Pleasures of Dystopia." Brave New World: Contexts and Legacies. Eds. Jonathan Greenberg and Nathan Waddell. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. 69-88. Halberstam, Judith. "Gender." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 116-120. Hollinger, Veronica. "(Re)reading Queerly: Science Fiction, Feminism, and the Defamiliarization of Gender." Science Fiction Studies. 20:1 (Mar. 1999): 23-40. Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper Perennial, 1932. Jackson, Shirley. "The Lottery." Writing with a Thesis: A Rhetoric and Readers. Eds. Sarah E. Skwire. Boston, MA: Thomson Wadsworth, 2007. 24-30. Kochhar-Lindgren, Kanta. "Disability." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 85-88. Lai, Larissa. Salt Fish Girl. Toronto, ON: Thomas Allen, 2002. Lai, Paul. "Stinky Bodies: Mythological Futures and the Olfactory Sense in Lairissa Lai's Salt Fish Girl. MELUS. 33.4 (Winter 2008): 167-187. Levitas, Ruth and Lucy Sargisson. "Utopia in Dark Times: Optimism/Pessimism and Utopia/Dystopia." Dark Horizons: Science Fiction and the Dystopian Imagination. Eds. Raffaella Baccolini and Tom Moylan. New York: Routledge, 2003. 13-27. Moore, C. L. "No Woman Born." Wopmen of Wonder: The Classic Years. Ed. Pamela Sargent. New York: Hartcourt, Brace, and Co., 1995: 21-64. Moylan, Tom. "Introduction: The Critical Utopia." Demand the Impossible: Science Fiction and the Utopian Imagination. New York: Methuen, 1986. 1-12. Moylan, Tom. "The Utopian Imagination." Demand the Impossible: Science Fiction and the Utopian Imagination. New York: Methuen, 1986. 15-28. Munoz, Jose Estaban. "Introduction: Feeling Utopia." Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity. New York: NYU Press, 2009. 1-18. Orwell, George. Nineteen Eighty-Four. New York: Plume, 1949. Russ, Joanna. "When It Changed." Science Fiction: Stories and Contexts. Ed. Heather Masri. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008. 767-774. Sheldon, Rebekah. "Somatic Capitalism: Reproduction, Futurity, and Feminist Science Fiction." Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology. 3 (2013). http://adanewmedia.org/2013/11/issue3-sheldon/. Web. Somerville, Siobhan B. "Queer." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 187-191. Stickgold-Sarah, Jessie. "'Your Children Will Know Us, You Never Will': The Pessimistic Utopia of Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis." Extrapolation. 51.3 (2010): 414-430. Tiptree, James, Jr. The Girl Who Was Plugged In. New York: Tor, 1973. Tirohl, Blu. "'We Are the Dead...You Are the Dead'. An Examination of Sexuality as a Weapon of Revolt in Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four." Journal of Gender Studies 9:1 (2000): 55-61. Varsam, Maria. "Concrete Dystopia: Slavery and Its Others." Dark Horizons: Science Fiction and the Dystopian Imagination. Eds. Raffaella Baccolini and Tom Moylan. New York: Routledge, 2003. 203-224. Wolf, Mark J.P. "Introduction." Building Imaginary Worlds: The Theory and History of Subcreation. New York: Routledge, 2012. 1-15. Yeates, Robert. "Urban Decay and Sexual Outlaws in the Blade Runner Universe." Science Fiction Studies 44.1 (Mar. 2017): 65-83. Media Arrival. Dir. Denis Villeneuve. Paramount Pictures, 2016. DVD. Blade Runner. Dir. Ridley Scott. Warner Bros., 1982. DVD.

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