Science Fiction Symposium at Georgia Tech, November 17, 2011, Open to Public

November 4, 2011

Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Communication, and Culture is an important place for the study of science fiction. It began with Bud Foote’s science fiction classes and the donation of his extensive science fiction and fantasy collection, and then it was further developed by Lisa Yaszek through her research, teaching, and organizing events. LCC also includes Kathleen Ann Goonan, the award winning science fiction writer, as a visiting professor.

Later this month, LCC is hosting a one-day science fiction symposium that is open to the public (except for the lunch, which is only for symposium participants). If you are in the Atlanta area, I would highly recommend this opportunity to learn about the strong presence of science fiction research at Georgia Tech and to meet some renowned science fiction authors. I have included the overview and schedule below:

Science
 Fiction 
Symposium
 Hosted 
by 
LCC
 Thursday,
 November 
17,
 2011

On Thursday, November 17, the School of Literature, Communication and Culture will host a day-long symposium spotlighting science fiction as a signature intersection of science, technology, and humanistic studies at Georgia Tech. The symposium will feature a series of scholarly panels involving faculty members from various disciplines, showcasing their involvement in science fiction study across various media, as a cultural phenomenon, and as it relates to issues of scientific and technical development. The symposium will also feature a presentation on the Science Fiction Collection at Georgia Tech (recently cited by Science Fiction Studies as one of the twenty most important such collections in the world), a report on student activities in the Science Fiction Research Lab at Tech, and readings by award-winning and critically-acclaimed 
science 
fiction
authors
 Kathleen 
Ann
 Goonan,
 Eugie
 Foster,
 J.M.
 McDermott
, and
 Chesya
 Burke.
 All
 presentations
 will 
be 
in 
Skiles
 rm.
 002. 
The
 Georgia 
Tech
 and
 Atlanta 
communities 
are 
invited 
to 
attend.*

9:30
am‐10:45
am:

 Science 
Fiction 
and
 Society
Jackie 
Royster 
(IAC/LCC), 
Tom 
Morely 
(MATH), 
Aaron 
Santesso 
(LCC,
 moderator), 
Richard 
Barke
(PubP), 
Kristie 
Champlan
 Gurley
(PubP)

10:45
am‐11:00
am:
Coffee
Break

11:00
am‐12:00
pm: 

Science
 Fiction
 Collection
 Presentation 
and
 Student 
Demos
Ryan
 Speer 
(LIB),
 Joshua
 Cuneo
 (LCC),
 Keith
 Johnson (LCC),
 Adam
 LeDoux
 (LCC),
 Paul 
Zaitsev
(LCC),
Lisa
Yaszek
 (LCC,
moderator)

12:00
pm‐1:30
pm:

 Catered 
Lunch
 for 
Symposium
 Participants 
with 
Author 
Reading
Kathy 
Goonan,
This
 Shared 
Dream
 (LCC)

1:30
pm‐2:45
pm:

 Speculative 
Fiction 
in
 Literary
 and
 Cultural 
History
Peter
 Brecke 
(INTA), 
Carol 
Senf 
(LCC,
moderator),
 Nihad
 Farooq
(LCC), 
Narin
 Hassan 
(LCC)

2:45 pm‐3:00 pm: Coffee Break

3:00 pm‐ 4:15 pm: Science Fiction Across Media
Michael Nitsche (LCC), Jay Telotte (LCC, moderator), Lisa Yaszek
(LCC), Nettrice Gaskins (LCC), Hank Whitson (LCC)

4:30 pm‐6:00 pm: Science Fiction in Atlanta: Author Reading and Book Signing
Kathy Goonan (LCC, moderator), J.M. McDermott, Eugie Foster, Chesya
Burke

*Except lunch, which will take place in Skiles 343 and is only for symposium participants.

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

SFRA Immediate Past President Lisa Yaszek Featured in Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine

March 23, 2011

SFRA Immediate Past President Lisa Yaszek is featured in the current issue of Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine in an Office Space article by Van Jensen:

Georgia Tech and science fiction are a natural fit, with the campus being a center for cutting-edge research in science and technology. No surprise then that Tech is a perfect setting for Lisa Yaszek, an associate professor and director of undergraduate studies in the School of Literature, Communication and Culture. Yaszek has devoted her career to speculative fiction — literature that examines the frontier of science and society. She has authored three books on the subject, served as president of the Science Fiction Research Association and is an editor of the science fiction studies journal Extrapolation. She shares some of her favorite sci-fi works and her vision of building a science fiction center at the Institute.

via Lisa Yaszek: Sci-fi Sage | Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine.

I’m happy to see Lisa getting props for her work in the Alumni Magazine, and I am also glad to see the Science Fiction Research Association mentioned and linked in the article online (it is also in the print version on pages 26-27). Lisa also reports significant happenings at Tech: a SF reading room at the library and the construction of an online SF encyclopedia and research portal. She says, “Our goal has always been to build on our resources and create a center for sci-fi.”

Georgia Tech is a wonderful place of learning that supports interdisciplinary research and teaching. Science Fiction research is an important part of that cooperation, because SF is at the interstices of science, technology, and culture. Besides the work that Lisa and other professors do there, Tech also features a growing special collection in the library: the Bud Foote Science Fiction Collection. It goes without saying that Georgia Tech is in my top 10 places that I would like to work in the future.

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

Announcement: Carol Senf’s ‘Bram Stoker’ Now Available

November 19, 2010

Carol Senf, my friend and professor at Georgia Tech, recently released a new book in the University of Wales Press Gothic Author: Critical Revision series on Bram Stoker.

Bram Stoker would be a useful book in gothic literature or Stoker focused classes, because Prof. Senf is a very thorough researcher and the paperback edition of Bram Stoker has a very student-friendly price point. Libraries should also add this to this to their collection on one of the most widely read and enduring works of literature.

Bram Stoker is now available through Amazon.com here.

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

Book Talk & Signing at Georgia Tech, Lisa Yaszek & Rebekah Sheldon, Nov 4, 2010

October 29, 2010

If you are in Atlanta on November 4, 2010 at 11:00am, you should go to the Georgia Tech Barnes and Noble Bookstore, 2nd floor Technology Center, to hear a book talk by Professor Lisa Yaszek and Brittain Fellow Rebekah Sheldon. Prof. Yaszek is going to talk about her role as co-editor of the Practicing Science Fiction: Critical Essays on Writing, Reading and Teaching the Genre anthology in which my essay “Revealing Critical Theory’s Real-Life Potential to Our Students, the Digital Nomads” appears. Sheldon will present on her essay, “Joanna Russ and the Murder of the Female Child: We Who Are About To,” from the anthology.

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

Kathleen Ann Goonan Speaks at Georgia Tech on “Consciousness, Literature, and Science Fiction”, Oct 12, 2010

October 5, 2010

Lisa Yaszek sent the following announcement out about the upcoming talk by award winning science fiction author Kathleen Ann Goonan at Georgia Tech on “Consciousness, Literature, and Science Fiction.” The presentation will take place on October 12 at 11:00am in the Library East Commons. I wish that I could go, because I think this Ms. Goonan’s presentation would be useful for my dissertation. She’s also a kind person with amazing ideas. Unfortunately, I am far away in the environs of Northeast Ohio, and I have job applications to prepare and a dissertation to write. I highly recommend you go to the event if you live in or around Atlanta!

The School of Literature, Communication, and Culture presents

critically-acclaimed science fiction author

Kathleen Ann Goonan

“Consciousness, Literature, and Science Fiction”

Tuesday, October 12, 2010, 11:00 a.m.

Library East Commons

Meet Kathleen Ann Goonan at a reception and book signing to follow the reading.

The author’s works include:

QUEEN CITY JAZZ

British Science Fiction Award Finalist

MISSISSIPPI BLUES

Hall of Fame Darryl Award Winner

THE BONES OF TIME

Arthur C. Clarke Award Finalist

LIGHT MUSIC

Nebula Award Finalist

CRESCENT CITY RHAPSODY

Nebula Award Finalist

IN WAR TIMES

Campbell Award Winner

ALA Winner, Best SF Novel

THIS SHARED DREAM

Forthcoming from Tor Books, 2011

Kathleen Ann Goonan, presently a Visiting Professor at the School of Literature, Communication, and Culture at Georgia Tech, is an award-winning science fiction writer.  The author of seven novels as well as myriad short stories, talks, essays, and commercial articles, she is interested in and writes about emergent trends in science and technology and their influence on culture.  Her web page is www.goonan.com.

Kathleen Ann Goonan’s lecture is part of the 2010-2011 LCC Distinguished Speaker Series. Visit www.lcc.gatech.edu for more information about Goonan and other Speaker Series events.

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

Free Public Lecture at Georgia Tech, April 1, Jorge Martins Rosa Talk on Philip K. Dick

March 29, 2010

For those science fiction oriented folks in the Atlanta area, I would encourage you to check out this free public lecture at Georgia Tech’s Library on April 1. I wish that I could be there, because I definitely would have some questions for Professor Rosa. Here are the details:

The School of Literature, Communication, and Culture

and the Science Fiction Collection at Georgia Tech present

science fiction studies scholar

Jorge Martins Rosa

Thursday, April 1, 2010, 11:00 a.m.

“Stars in My Pocket”

FREE PUBLIC LECTURE

The Neely Room

Georgia Tech Library and Information Center

The trope of space exploration, which has attracted so many writers of genre science fiction, still remains one of its hallmarks. Professor Rosa, however, questions the true centrality of this trope within science fiction as it has evolved beyond the space operas of the so-called Golden Age. Perhaps, as David Hartwell argues in Age of Wonders in regards to the Moon landing and other achievements from the American space program “When it comes true… it’s no fun anymore.”

While establishing the truth of Hartwell’s hypothesis may be difficult to undertake within the limitations of a single talk, Professor Rosa will look at the peculiar way Philip K. Dick approached the trope of space exploration in his own fiction. In particular, he will explore how Dick anticipated the exhaustion of this trope—or rather, its substitution for a more inner (should we say “virtual”?) approach to space.

Jorge Martins Rosa is Assistant Professor of Communication Sciences at the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal, where he teaches courses including the post-graduate seminars “Fictional Modes:  Fiction and Technology” and “Cyberculture.”  His research interests involve the connections between literature, science, and digital culture. His visit to Georgia Tech is part of a research project on “Fiction and the Roots of Cyberculture.”

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

SFRA 2009, Five Months Away

January 13, 2009

It’s already the middle of January and SFRA 2009 in Atlanta, Georgia is only five months away!  Remember to get in your paper and panel proposals to sfra2009@gmail.com by 1 April 2009 (no kidding!).  For all of you folks needing early semester confirmation for institutional funding, submit your proposals in the next seven days by 20 January 2009.  

I’m particularly excited about the terrific special author lineup that we have this year.  Our Guest of Honor is Michael Bishop, and the Special Guest Authors are F. Brett Cox, Paul di Filippo, Andy Duncan, Kathleen Ann Goonan, Jack McDevitt, and Warren Rochelle.  

If you haven’t seen one of the ubiquitous emails that I’ve been sending out as SFRA’s Publicity Director, then see the CFP below for more details.  

SFRA 2009: Engineering the Future and Southern-Fried Science Fiction and Fantasy

June 11-14, Atlanta, GA (Wyndham Midtown Hotel)

Guest of Honor: Michael Bishop

Special Guest Authors: F. Brett Cox, Paul di Filippo, Andy Duncan, Kathleen Ann Goonan, Jack McDevitt, and Warren Rochelle.

SFRA is currently accepting individual abstracts and panel proposal for its 2009 conference. We welcome paper and panel submissions that explore any aspect of science fiction across history and media and are particularly interested in those that engage one or both of the conference themes, “Engineering the Future” and “Southern-FriedScience Fiction and Fantasy,” or the work of one or more of the conference’s guest authors.

The 2009 conference’s two themes and its selection of guest authors are inspired by the conference’s location in Atlanta and its co-sponsorship by Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Communication, and Culture. Atlanta, a storied locale in American history, is also in many ways an international city of the future, home to 21st century information, entertainment, technological and military industries, peopled with 21st century demographics, and prone to 21st century situations.

How is the future engineered in science fiction and how has science fiction already engineered our present? The American south has long been well known for its gothic fiction, but it has increasingly figured in works of science fiction and fantasy too. So it is equally fitting to ask, how has the south been an inspiration of science fiction and fantasy and what will its global future in speculative arts and letters be?

The deadline for proposals is April 1, 2009 at midnight EST. Please submit paper and panel proposals by email to sfra2009@gmail.com. Include all text of the proposal in the body of the email (not as an attachment). Please be sure to include full contact information for all panel members and to make all AV requests within each proposal.

For more information, email sfra2009@gmail.com. And be sure to check out www.sfra2009.com for more details!

1 Comment | Conference, Georgia Tech, Science Fiction, SFRA | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Jason W Ellis

SFRA 2009 in Atlanta Announcement

July 19, 2008

Lisa Yaszek and Doug Davis have announced the 2009 Science Fiction Research Association 40th annual conference in Atlanta, Georgia.  I’ll be there–will you?

See below for the details!

SFRA 2009: Engineering the Future and Southern-Fried Science Fiction and Fantasy
June 11-14, Atlanta, GA (Wyndham Midtown Hotel)
Guest of Honor: Michael Bishop
Special Guest Authors: F. Brett Cox, Paul di Filippo, Andy Duncan, Kathleen Ann Goonan, and Jack McDevitt
Hosted by: Lisa Yaszek and Doug Davis

SFRA is currently accepting individual abstracts and panel proposal for its 2009 conference. We welcome paper and panel submissions that explore any aspect of science fiction across history and media and are particularly interested in those that engage one or both of the conference themes, “Engineering the Future” and “Southern-Fried Science Fiction and Fantasy,” or the work of one or more of the conference’s guest authors.

The 2009 conference’s two themes and its selection of guest authors are inspired by the conference’s location in Atlanta and its co-sponsorship by Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Communication, and Culture. Atlanta, a storied locale in American history, is also in many ways an international city of the future, home to 21st century information, entertainment, technological and military industries, peopled with 21st century demographics, and prone to 21st century situations.

How is the future engineered in science fiction and how has science fiction already engineered our present? The American south has long been well known for its gothic fiction, but it has increasingly figured in works of science fiction and fantasy too. So it is equally fitting to ask, how has the south been an inspiration of science fiction and fantasy and what will its global future in speculative arts and letters be?

The deadline for proposals is April 1, 2009 at midnight EST. Please submit paper and panel proposals by email to sfra2009@gmail.com . Include all text of the proposal in the body of the email (not as an attachment). Please be sure to include full contact information for all panel members and to make all AV requests within each proposal.

For more information, email sfra2009@gmail.com. And as of September 1, 2008, be sure to check out www.sfra2009.com for more details!

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

Kim Stanley Robinson at Georgia Tech

February 28, 2008

The eminent SF utopian/heterotopian author, Kim Stanley Robinson will be at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Georgia next week for a radio interview, a public lecture, and book signing.  Georgia Tech with its Bud Foote Science Fiction Collection (Bud Foote interviewed Robinson for Science-Fiction Studies #62, here) curated by Professor Lisa Yaszek is a nexus of significant work within academia as well as providing public events involving leading figures within the field.  Robinson, the author of the Mars Trilogy and the Three Californias Trilogy (which I find compelling and enjoyable), is the most recent SF author to make an appearance at Georgia Tech following other notable authors such as Kathleen Ann Goonan and Paul Di Filippo.

Here’s the schedule for Robinson’s visit to Georgia Tech:

Thursday, March 6

11AM-12PM – WREK FM 91.1 Interview and Author Q&A in the Library East Commons

4PM-6PM – Lecture on “Representing Climate Change in Science Fiction and the Real World” in the Clary Theater, Bill Moore Student Success Center (reception follows)

Friday, March 7

12PM-1:30PM – Book signing at Barnes and Noble on Spring Street in Tech Square

I’m insanely jealous that I can’t make it to the event since I’m snowed-in up in Kent, Ohio (and that I have a lot of fucking work to do).  Pass along my best to Mr. Robinson!

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

SF Lab Radio Show Special – Movies

February 16, 2008

Catch the latest installment of the Georgia Tech SF Lab Radio Show on FM91.1 in Atlanta, Georgia or online at wrek.org tomorrow night, Sunday between 7-9 PM. This episode focuses on SF film, and I’ll be reading an 8 minute review based on my “Forced Deep Throat in AVP2” blog post.

Mark your calendars that the third Sunday between 7-9PM is the new time slot for the SF Lab Radio Show.  Here’s a sneak peak at the upcoming episodes:

  • March 16th – SF and Environmentalism
  • April 20th – Gaming
  • May 15th – TBD
  • June 15th – TBD

Tune-in and enjoy!

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Posted by Jason W Ellis

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