Last modified: 25 Sep 2019 09:58
The course offers students the opportunity to study a genre (science fiction) in the context of modern Irish and Scottish literature, science fiction is a genre developed by major Scottish writers – such as Robert Louis Stevenson – and also popularised by Irish writers such as C.S.Lewis. It has been a key element in some of the most innovative work by modern Irish and Scottish novelists – such as Flann O’Brien, Alasdair Gray and Iain M. Banks – and has been adopted as the medium of feminist critique by writers such as Naomi Mitchison and A.L. Kennedy who have built on the early and pioneering work of Mary Shelley. Science fiction, as a genre, is closely allied with imperialism and its consequences, and the relationship of Ireland and Scotland to the British Empire has made science fiction a particularly pertinent way of addressing such issues.
| Study Type | Undergraduate | Level | 4 |
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| Term | Second Term | Credit Points | 30 credits (15 ECTS credits) |
| Campus | Aberdeen | Sustained Study | No |
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The course provides a historical overview of the development of the science fiction genre in Ireland and in Scotland. The course begins from the classic origins of science fiction in Jonathan Swift’s satirical representation of scientific experiment in Gulliver’s Travels and in Mary Shelley’s gothic exploration of scientific ambition in Frankenstein, and concludes with (near)-contemporary science fiction by writers such as Iain M. Banks, Ken Macleod and A.L. Kennedy. It explores a variety of different kinds of science fiction, from the classic space travel of A Plunge into Space from the 1890s, to the psychological science journeys of David Lindsay’s Voyage to Arcturus or Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman from the 1920s and 30s, to the ‘Culture’ novels in which Iain M. Banks envisages a distant future in which a Utopian society has to confront its dystopian rivals.
Information on contact teaching time is available from the course guide.
| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 20 | |
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| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback | Word Count | 1500 | ||
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| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 70 | |
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| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback | Word Count | 4500 | ||
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| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 10 | |
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| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
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| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
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There are no assessments for this course.
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