Learn From My Mistakes: Some Pedagogical Experiments in STS and Speculative Fiction and How to Fail Better Than Me

• In Event: Spitballing STS: Millenial Tactics

Abstract

As a nerd and STS scholar, I have frequently attempted, with varying degrees of success, to integrate speculative fiction into my classes. In this presentation, I will describe some of my past attempts, focusing on assignments and exercises involving both reading and writing speculative fiction. These include using short stories to interrogate engineering ethics, teaching Donna Haraway using Ursula K. Le Guin, leading students in workshopping short stories, and an exercise aimed at firmly situating technoscience in social--and narrative--contexts. I will talk about what worked (Iron Man), what didn't work (pulp-era hard science fiction), what I would do differently (basically all of it), and how you can best capitalize on my mistakes to make students read and write about spaceships and somehow learn from it.

Author

• Kristen Koopman