Taryn Richmond

• Science Fiction: A science fiction story is a narrative (usually in prose) of short, novella or novel length. As what it is about, this is not easily classifiable. Such stories are about an amazing variety of things, topics, and ideas. They include trips to other worlds, quests, the exploration of space, visits to other planets and interplanetary warfare.

A Dictionary of Literary Terms. 4^th ed. J.A. Cuddon: Blackwell Publishers, 1998.

• Science Fiction: The fictional treatment in books, magazines, motion pictures, television, compact discs, and other media of the effects of science or future events on human beings. Science fiction deals with events that did not happen, or have not yet happened. It considers these events rationally and is concerned with the impact of change on people. Common subjects for science include the future, travel through space or time, life on other planets, and crises created by technology or by alien creatures and environments.

http://www.encarta.msn.com/find/concise.asp?z=1&pg=2&ti=761563.23

Note: Fanciful stories go as far back as there are records, but the rational consideration of marvelous things that is characteristic of modern science fiction was uncommon in early times. Instead a group of genres, subgenres, or motif bearers offers fragmentary ideas later to be found in science fiction, where they are sometimes combined, sometimes rendered more sophisticated. The classical utopia, the imaginary voyages, the lunar voyage, the Faustian invention story, the catastrophe story, the tale of futurity, and the imaginary war story are examples.

The New Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Ed. James Gunn: Penguin Group: NY 1988.

Related Genres: horror movies, fantasy, action, drama

Representational Genre: combination: dramatic dialogue + narrator

Narrative Genre: tragedy, romance, comedy, satire (any and all)

Example: George Lucas, Star Wars (1977)

Highlights of Example: futuristic weapons (lightsaber), aliens with humanistic characteristics, life on other planets; they are on a quest

Additional Examples of the Genre: books: Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination (1996); Robert Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land. movies: Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956); Sphere (1998); The Fifth Element (1997); Mission to Mars (1999)

Research Sources: see above

• What other elements do you expect to find in science fiction film or literature?
• What impact do you think this genre has on American culture today?