Course Schedule - Spring Semester 2024

     

ENGL 279 001 (CRN: 25081)

BLACK SCI-FI

Long Title: BLACK SCI-FI & SPECULATIVE FICTIONS
Department: English
Instructor: Waligora-Davis, Nicole
Meeting: 9:25AM - 10:40AM TR TBD TBA (8-JAN-2024 - 19-APR-2024) 
Session: Full Term
Grade Mode: Standard Letter
Course Type: Lecture
Language of Instruction: Taught in English
Distribution Group: Distribution Group I
Analyzing Diversity: Yes
Method of Instruction: Face to Face
Credit Hours: 3
Course Syllabus:
Course Materials: Rice Campus Store
 
Restrictions:
Must be enrolled in one of the following Level(s):
Undergraduate Professional
Visiting Undergraduate
Undergraduate
Section Max Enrollment: 25
Section Enrolled: 12
Waitlisted: 0 (Max 99) 
Current members of the waitlist have priority for available seats.
Enrollment data as of: 1-DEC-2023 3:13AM
 
Additional Fees: None
 
Final Exam: No Final Exam
 
Description: This course examines how black science and speculative fiction worries the division between reality and fantasy; challenges the fictions embedded in our national histories; and underscores the social, economic, and political inequities short-circuiting the lives of brown and black peoples around the world. Focusing on works from Octavia Butler to Victor Levalle, from George Schuyler to Mat Johnson, from John Williams to Colson Whitehead among others, the course engages the ways in which these authors represent the monstrous and grotesque; pandemics, environmental and technological degradation and catastrophe; urbanization, gentrification, and immigration; and (biological/technological) warfare, in order to recalibrate our understanding of the central role race plays in determining both access to, and allocation of, necessary resources. We will track the histories and afterlives of slavery and colonialism that continue to transfigure our society, while also studying varied blueprints for, and critiques of, alternative, more egalitarian societies imagined by these artists.