Assignments

Critical Essay & Question Presentation (10%) -- You will be a required to sign up for an oral presentation (in small groups) during the course of the quarter. For your presentation, you will read the texts assigned for a particular week, research a scholarly essay relevant to the texts and course, distribute the essay to the class the week prior, generate a critical question or two, and get the class discussion started for the day.

Creative Responses (10%) -- Not only will you be reading speculative and science fictions, you will write your own to explore and demonstrate the ideas and goals of the course. Over the course of the semester, you will complete a drawing, write a short-short story, and write a critical review. These creative responses will be evaluated on completion and your critical, thoughtful engagement with the prompts.

Critical Response Papers (20%) -- These single-spaced, one-page writings serve as close readings of, analyses of, and articulations of the texts and connections you see, read, and talk about in class. These responses are more than just summaries or personal reactions and will be graded on clarity, focus, coherence, critique, and your ability to concisely formulate arguments. You will be required to generate a response paper approximately every other week for a minimum of 5.

Project Proposal Memo (10%) -- As part of your Final Project research and writing process, you must generate a 1-page research proposal in business memo format. You will also arrange for a conference with me to go over your proposal. Proposals will be graded for clarity, detail, completion, and manuscript format. Your proposal and conference must be completed at least 4 weeks prior to the end of the semester.

Final Paper/Project (20%) -- You will complete a Final Project that integrates what you have read, explored, and written about in your Response Papers, that draws on specific terms, concepts, or issues from the class, and that articulates the critical value of African American science fiction. The project asks you to make connections and to create an argument across different kinds of evidence and added research. Your final project can be a traditional research paper, a media production (which includes a substantive analytical component), or a hybrid of the two.

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

What is Close Reading?

How to Write a Summary

Claims, Claims, Claims

Claims Example Worksheet

Introductions & Conclusions

Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing

MLA Citation and Bibliographic Format

Revision Check-List

Readings

Course readings are available via the course Blackboard or online.

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

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Penguin Books, 1994. Adams, Rachel, Benjamin Reiss, and David Serlin. “Disability.” Keywords for Disability Studies. Eds. Rachel Adams, Benjamin Reiss and David Serlin. New York: New York University Press, 2015. https://keywords.nyupress.org/disability-studies/essay/disability/. Aultman, B. "Cisgender." Postposttranssexual: Key Concepts for a 21st Century Transgender Studies. Spec. issue of TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly 1.1-2 (2014) 61-62. Capek, Karel. R.U.R. Dover, 2001. Ferguson, Robert A. "Race." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 191-196. Halberstam, Judith. "Gender." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 116-120. Hernandez, Gilbert and Jaime. Maggie the Mechanic (Love and Rockets Library Vol. 1). Fantagraphic Books, 2017. Hopkingson, Nalo. Brown Girl in the Ring. Warner Books, 1998. 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. Thomas Allen Publishers, 2002. Marquez, Gabriel Garcia. One Hundred Years of Solitude. Harper Perennial, 2006. Nguyen, Qui. She Kills Monsters. Samuel French, Inc., 2016. Okorafor, Nnedi. Who Fears Death. DAW, 2014. Roanhorse, Rebecca. Trail of Lightning. Saga Press, 2018. Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood. Pantheon, 2004. Somerville, Siobhan B. "Queer." Keywords for American Cultural Studies. Eds. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. 187-191. Thornber, Karen L. "Why (Not) World Literature: Challenges and Opportunities for the Twenty-First Century." Journal of World Literature. 1 (2016): 107-118. Williams, Cristan. "Transgender." Postposttranssexual: Key Concepts for a 21st Century Transgender Studies. Spec. issue of TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly 1.1-2 (2014) 232-234. Print.

Media

Other media:

The Wandering Earth. Directed by Frant Gwo, Netflix, 2019.

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