Science Fiction Literature, Anyone?

[riot_grrrl88]

Hello!

I am a current graduate student (my MA will be completed by Spring 2018) and I'm looking to apply for doctoral programs later this year.  As it stands, much of my graduate course work and my thesis are dealing with contemporary science fiction literature in various forms.  By the application season I will have made multiple conference appearances for my work in the field. All that is left is finding the right school that will allow me to continue my work. Do any of you have any suggestions on where I should look into applying? Thank you so much for any help/advice!

[biyutefulphlower]

Hi There @riot_grrrl88! The U of Florida has a Science Fiction working group that may be of interest to you (http://sciencefiction.group.ufl.edu/about/).  I can't tell you much about it as I'm starting there in the Fall, but it may help as a jump-off point as you start looking at programs. I'd also recommend looking into S.F. scholars you admire/would like to work with and see where they may be teaching. 

[PetiteFilleNoire]

UCR English has quite a folks interested in and a designated emphasis in speculative fiction. 

[WildeThing]

I know people doing Sci-Fi in California-Riverside and Missouri-Lawrence and they're pretty happy.

[Bumblebea]

Off the top of my head--Ohio State, Florida, Maryland, and Kansas has the Gunn Center (http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/)...

And to be very honest with you, any program with a strong 20th-century program will be able to support you in science fiction. It's not as off-the-beaten path as it was even 10 years ago (when I started grad school). I know a lot of people who do speculative fiction without a lot of faculty oversight. It's very much a growing field--perhaps because English enrollments are down nationwide and adding science fiction courses has been a way for departments to attract undergrads looking to take a fun elective. I'd actually be surprised if there were that many programs out there that would just say, "No, we don't do that."

 

[RydraWong]

I'm starting a PhD program at UW-Madison in the fall, with a focus on feminist science fiction, and I second all the recommendations made thus far. I'd also recommend Indiana University, the University of Washington and UC Davis. These are the other programs I was deciding between and they each have at least one faculty member who specializes in science fiction. I also went to UC Davis for undergrad and got lots of great mentorship for my research interests in science fiction; the faculty members there are truly excellent. Definitely shoot me a PM if you want to discuss the Davis program in depth.  

[wrighna]

I have zero clue what the grad programs are like, but University of Oregon's special collections has the complete papers of Ursula LeGuin, James Tiptree/Alice Sheldon, and smatterings of Joanna Russ, Samuel Delaney, and others I'm forgetting! Carol Stabille is the professor I'm familiar with whose done work with these collections, but she teaches in the school of Journalism. Probably not super helpful, but I saw Fem Sci Fi so I thought I'd pitch that in.

[EspritHabile]

I had similar interests during my MA program (so I'd be happy to chat with you about your work), and seriously considered the program at UC Riverside. As others have noted here, there are also programs in comparative literature or literature that would allow you to focus in your own way on science fiction studies. I was able to combine ecocriticism and rhetorical studies with science fiction for my earlier graduate work even though there was not a specific concentration in my department to "allow" that sort of thing.

I think some good general advice would be to review your old conference programs to see where people you admire are attending. Same for scholars in the field that you admire (Gary K. Wolfe, for example, earned his Ph.D. at U. of Chicago). And if you haven't already, check out the Science Fiction Research Association's conference website (this year's conference, as you may already know, is hosted at UC Riverside).

The University of Kansas also has a science fiction research center, which might offer some resources to support your interests.

 

 

 

[riot_grrrl88]

On 5/4/2017 at 10:56 AM, biyutefulphlower said:

Hi There @riot_grrrl88! The U of Florida has a Science Fiction working group that may be of interest to you (http://sciencefiction.group.ufl.edu/about/).  I can't tell you much about it as I'm starting there in the Fall, but it may help as a jump-off point as you start looking at programs. I'd also recommend looking into S.F. scholars you admire/would like to work with and see where they may be teaching. 

My thesis chair actually went to U of Florida. I've planned to pick his brain about the program itself when the Fall semester starts back up. I'm very interested in finding a program that not only fits my research, but also will lead into semi-decent job placement. I've been slowly traveling towards freaking out over where I'll eventually end up. That's assuming I even make it into a doctoral program at all (the acceptance rates on this site scare me), ha.

22 hours ago, EspritHabile said:

I had similar interests during my MA program (so I'd be happy to chat with you about your work), and seriously considered the program at UC Riverside. As others have noted here, there are also programs in comparative literature or literature that would allow you to focus in your own way on science fiction studies. I was able to combine ecocriticism and rhetorical studies with science fiction for my earlier graduate work even though there was not a specific concentration in my department to "allow" that sort of thing.

I think some good general advice would be to review your old conference programs to see where people you admire are attending. Same for scholars in the field that you admire (Gary K. Wolfe, for example, earned his Ph.D. at U. of Chicago). And if you haven't already, check out the Science Fiction Research Association's conference website (this year's conference, as you may already know, is hosted at UC Riverside).

The University of Kansas also has a science fiction research center, which might offer some resources to support your interests.

So, funny thing. I'll actually be presenting at SFRA's conference in June. I definitely plan to spend time checking out the UCR program and chatting with presenters from non-UCR programs about how grad school is going for them.

On 5/4/2017 at 6:16 PM, Bumblebea said:

Off the top of my head--Ohio State, Florida, Maryland, and Kansas has the Gunn Center (http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/)...

And to be very honest with you, any program with a strong 20th-century program will be able to support you in science fiction. It's not as off-the-beaten path as it was even 10 years ago (when I started grad school). I know a lot of people who do speculative fiction without a lot of faculty oversight. It's very much a growing field--perhaps because English enrollments are down nationwide and adding science fiction courses has been a way for departments to attract undergrads looking to take a fun elective. I'd actually be surprised if there were that many programs out there that would just say, "No, we don't do that."

Ah, I've actually been wondering about how successful I would be with finding programs if I choose 20th Century Lit as a field of study. I'm glad that others have had the same thought. I'll have to reach out to some of the schools I'm interested in and ask. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

And thanks to everyone for the help!

[Tybalt]

On 5/4/2017 at 7:16 PM, Bumblebea said:

Off the top of my head--Ohio State, Florida, Maryland, and Kansas has the Gunn Center (http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/)...

And to be very honest with you, any program with a strong 20th-century program will be able to support you in science fiction. It's not as off-the-beaten path as it was even 10 years ago (when I started grad school). I know a lot of people who do speculative fiction without a lot of faculty oversight. It's very much a growing field--perhaps because English enrollments are down nationwide and adding science fiction courses has been a way for departments to attract undergrads looking to take a fun elective. I'd actually be surprised if there were that many programs out there that would just say, "No, we don't do that."

 

The above is some great advice.  There are some programs with defined specialties in the area.  Beyond that, the key is to figure out which programs have profs who could make up your committee.  Look at it not just as trying to find a "S.F." school, but a school that has people who can do S.F. AND the things that intersect with your work.  What, for example, is your particular interest IN S.F.?  Gender?  Race?  Technology?  Utopia?  Post-Apocalyptic?  In what genre/mode?  Television?  Film?  Novels?  You want to find a school where you can form a committee.  Case in point, my school (Rochester) doesn't have a dedicated S.F. person, but we have a post-modernist (Jeff Tucker) who does S.F., Utopia, and issues of race.  We also have an Anglo-Saxonist (Sarah Higley) whose academic specialty is Old English and gendered monstrosity, but she's also written professionally in the S.F. world (she wrote the episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation that debuted the Reg Barclay character, for example). 

That's my advice for ANYONE looking at making a list of programs for an application season.  Don't hunt for a singular advisor.  Hunt for a committee.