Schedule

This schedule is likely to change – always check the week before readings are due. Follow the links and read or watch assigned material before class unless otherwise stated.


Unit 1: Imagining Otherwise


Week 1

Tuesday 8/27: no class.
Post introductory blog entry and complete confidential questionnaire. (If you join class late, do these tasks immediately.)

Thursday 8/29
Introductory Imaginings

  • Walidah Imarisha, “Introduction” to Octavia’s Brood (OB) 
  • Dani McClain, “Homing Instinct” (OB)
  • adrienne maree brown, “The River” (OB)

Tuesday 9/3:

Week 2

Tuesday 9/3
Speculative Language

Thursday 9/5
Speculative Justice


Week 3

Tuesday 9/10
Practitioner Research

  • In class film screening: Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin (2019)

Thursday 9/12
Practitioner presentations


Unit 2: After Capitalism?


Week 4
Anarchist Worldbuilding, Ambiguous Utopia 1

Tuesday 9/17

  • Le Guin, The Dispossessed chapters 1-5

Thursday 9/19

  • Le Guin, The Dispossessed chapters 6-8

Week 5
Anarchist Worldbuilding, Ambiguous Utopia 2

Tuesday 9/24

Thursday 9/26


Week 6

Tuesday 10/1
Speculating on Gendered Power

Thursday 10/3
Exploring Speculative Form

Adaptation Due: Monday October 7


Unit 2: Confronting Realities

Week 7
Shaping Change with Octavia E. Butler 1

Tuesday 10/8

Thursday 10/10

  • Butler, Parable of the Sower chapters 1-5
    • content note: vivid representations of interpersonal and institutional violence, including sexual and gendered violence

Week 8
Shaping Change with Octavia E. Butler 2

Tuesday 10/15

  • Butler, Parable of the Sower chapters 6-20
    • content note: vivid representations of interpersonal and institutional violence, including sexual and gendered violence

Thursday 10/17


Week 9

Tuesday 20/22

Thursday 10/24: no class

Application due: Monday 10/28


Unit 3: Rethinking History, Reimagining Futures

Week 10: Speculative bodies

Tuesday 10/29

  • Charlie Jane Anders, “Don’t Press Charges and I Won’t Sue” (2017)
  • Bao Phi, “Revolution Shuffle” (OB)
  • Walidah Imarisha, “Black Angel” (OB)
    • content note: vivid representations of institutional, interpersonal, and medical violence, transphobia and racism

Thursday 10/31

  • Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, “Preface: Writing (with) a Movement from Bed” in Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice (2018)
  • Piepza-Samarasinha, “Children Who Fly” (OB)
  • Mia Mingus, “Hollow” (OB)
    • content note: institututional violence, trauma, mental illness

Friday 11/1: Nominations due for week 13 texts


Week 11: Speculative Blackness

Tuesday 11/5

Thursday 11/7

Student-selected readings: final vote.


Week 12

Tuesday 11/12: Online Discussion (no class)

  • Solomon, An Unkindness of Ghosts, Parts II and III
    • content note: vivid representations of institutional racial and gendered violence

Thursday 11/14

  • Solomon, An Unkindness of Ghosts, Part IV
  • Solomon, “Black Girl Going Mad” (2017)
    • content note: vivid representations of institutional racial and gendered violence

Visionary fiction due: Tuesday November 19


Week 13
Student-Selected Readings
/Viewings

Tuesday 11/19

Thursday 11/21


Week 14

Tuesday 11/26

  • Worldbuilding Project: Preliminary Workshop
    Bring one page of writing or a short piece of media that explains your project. Include the issues you hope to address, the format you are using, and 2-3 questions you will have to answer in your final project.

Thursday 11/28

  • Thanksgiving: No Class

Week 15

Tuesday 12/3

  • Worldbuilding Project Presentations

Thursday 12/5

  • Worldbuilding Project Presentations.

Saturday December 14

Final Worldbuilding Projects, all late work, and Participation Self-Evaluations Due

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