English 121d: 'Hard' Science Fiction

In-person instruction. Seminar (15 students) for undergraduates. Attracted students from a range of disciplines, including Compsci, Biology, English, & STS. Course Essential Question: “What is Hard SF and why do we care?” Taught using interdisciplinary approaches to classifying genre within SF, using methodologies from the digital humanities, literary criticism, and the social sciences. Summative assessments included an op-ed on rigor in SF and a final position paper that defined the genre and examined the affordances of that definition.