Tuesday, November 3
Introduction to Conventions of Science Fiction
Read and discuss “By the Waters of Babylon”
- purpose and message?
- use of conventions?
- setting & vivid, sensory description
HW: Read “There Will Be Soft Rains” and write a half page explaining how and
where this story employs science fiction conventions
Thursday, November 5
Discuss homework reading and story conventions
Read and discuss “The Nine Billion Names of God”
- plot, characters and setting?
- science fiction conventions?
- purpose, theme or message?
Journal Prompt: In all the examples of science fiction we have read, the course of human (and sometimes the universe’s) history is shifted because people have somehow tampered with science or technology. Brainstorm types of technology or forms of science that strike you as potentially destructive if abused. Then select one from your list and cluster out some ideas until you have a rough idea of a plot. Finally, write a 1 or 2 page scene (NOT whole story) that depicts the moment a) right before something goes terribly and irrevocably wrong; b) the moment when the characters or human race realize something has just gone disastrously wrong; or c) long after the turning point in human history, from the point of view of whoever or whatever remains.
HW: Complete journal assignment for Monday, 11/9
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