[csaa-forum] Event announcement: Viral Science Fiction, a Virtual Roundtable

[Sean Redmond]

On behalf of Deakin’s Reading and Screening the Fantastique Research group





Viral Science Fiction, a Virtual Roundtable



Join us for this important conversation via Zoom on Monday 14 September, 2-3pm AEST.



Please Register here<https://www.eventbrite.com/e/viral-science-fiction-a-virtual-roundtable-tickets-118245640895>



While science fiction often reflects human fears and anxieties, it can also encourage audiences to reconsider the world from different perspectives and in more hopeful, productive ways. Understanding the COVID-19 pandemic through the lens of science fiction means engaging with both fear and hope in an attempt to reconcile the unreality of our current circumstances.



From Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend (1954) and Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy (2003-2013) to Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead (2004) and Kim Seong-hun’s Kingdom series (2019), viral science fiction presents a unique opportunity for both audiences and researchers to better understand what it means to live during a pandemic.



This virtual roundtable will explore what science fiction and related genres can reveal about the everyday challenges, socio-political upheavals and ethical implications of the current pandemic. With a range of expertise across literary studies, media and entertainment and cultural studies, our presenters will navigate these complexities as they each speak to the topic of "Viral Science Fiction", discussing film and literature, pandemic media, zombies, the Anthropocene, and more. The roundtable will then conclude with a Q and A discussion.





Speakers:



ANNE CRANNY-FRANCIS is Adjunct Professor at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) & Associate Researcher at the Centre for Transformative Media Technologies, Swinburne. She is currently finishing the book, Jack Lindsay: writer, Romantic, revolutionary and continues her research on embodiment, technology and culture. Her books include Feminist Fiction: Feminist Uses of Generic Fiction (1990), Engendered Fictions: Analysing gender in the production and reception of texts (1992), Popular Culture (1994), The Body in the Text (1995), Multimedia: Texts and Contexts (2005) and Technology and Touch: the Biopolitics of Emerging Technologies (2013), as well as the co-edited Feminine, Masculine and Representation (1990) and the co-written Gender Studies: Terms and Debates (2003). Web page: https://uts.academia.edu/AnneCrannyFrancis



ANITA JABOOR is a PhD candidate in the School of Communication and Creative Arts at Deakin University. Her research focus is climate change fiction. Through an exploration of literary texts representative of climate concerns, Anita is examining the way that these texts use space and time to critically comment against climate devastation. She has written a paper, ‘The End of the Road: Constructing the Enigmatic Character’, for In/Stead, and presented at The Double Dialogues conference at The University of the South Pacific in Suva, Fiji.



ANDREW MILNER is Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature at Monash University. His publications include John Milton and the English Revolution (1981), The Road to St Kilda Pier (1984), Cultural Materialism (1993), Class (1999), Re-Imagining Cultural Studies (2002), Contemporary Cultural Theory (2002), Literature, Culture and Society (2005), Tenses of Imagination: Raymond Williams on Utopia, Dystopia and Science Fiction (2010), Locating Science Fiction (2012), Again, Dangerous Visions: Essays in Cultural Materialism (2018) and Science Fiction and Climate Change (2020, co-authored with J.R. Burgmann).



ANGELA NDALIANIS is Research Professor in Media and Entertainment, and Director of the Centre for Transformative Media Technologies at Swinburne University of Technology. Her research focuses on entertainment media; visual effects technologies; the transformative nature of media technologies – past and present – and how they impact on embodiment, the senses and perception; and the superhero, horror and science fiction genres. Her publications include Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment (MIT Press 2004), Science Fiction Experiences (New Academia 2010), The Horror Sensorium: Media and the Senses (McFarland 2012) and the edited books The Contemporary Comic Book Superhero (editor, Routledge 2009), Neo-baroques: From Latin America to the Hollywood Blockbuster (co-editor, Rodopi Press/Brill 2016), and Fans and Videogames: Histories, Fandom, Archives (co-editor, Routledge, 2017).



This roundtable will be held via Zoom and parts of the event will be recorded. Zoom details will be sent to ticket holders the day before the event.

Reading & Screening the Fantastique is an interdisciplinary research network that explores science fiction, speculative fiction, fantasy, horror and the supernatural across the art forms. The group consists of postgraduates and academics working within film studies, literary studies, creative writing, education, bioethics, technoscience, gender studies, media studies and more. First established at Deakin University, the group extends beyond this to scholars around Australia, with the hope of connecting with others internationally. You can find them on Twitter at @RSTFantastique<https://twitter.com/RSTFantastique>.


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