UWP Lecturers Upcoming Science Fiction-Related Events at UC-Riverside

[Rob Latham]

Upcoming Science Fiction-Related Events at UC-Riverside

The state’s budget cuts have had a devastating impact on plans to  
develop a science fiction studies program here at UCR, but I do plan  
to keep the torch burning through these dark times with a number of  
major events slated for 2010 and early 2011.


The 32nd Annual Writers Week celebration, which runs from February  
8-15, 2010, will include a colloquium on science fiction featuring  
Gregory Benford, Larry Niven, and Sheila Finch, moderated by me. The  
panel will take place on February 9, from 12-2 PM, in the reading room  
of the Special Collections and Archives Department of the Rivera  
library, with a reception following. This is believed to be the first  
science fiction-themed event in the history of Writers Week,  
California’s longest-running free literary festival.

The Second Annual Science Fiction Studies Symposium will be held on  
May 27, 2010, from 2:30-5:00 PM in the reading room of the Special  
Collections and Archives Department of the Rivera library, which  
houses the J. Lloyd Eaton Collection of Science Fiction, Fantasy,  
Horror, and Utopian Literature. The SF Studies Symposium brings  
together three major scholars to speak on a topic of theoretical  
importance to the field. (The proceedings from the first Symposium  
will be published in the March 2010 issue of the journal.) The 2010  
theme is “Animal Studies and Science Fiction,” and the participants  
will be Sherryl Vint, Joan Gordon, and Carol McGuirk (the titles of  
whose talks may be found on the spiffy flyer, designed by Sara  
Stilley, attached to this email). At the reception following the  
talks, we hope to be able to celebrate the launch of Professor Vint’s  
new book, Animal Alterity: Science Fiction and the Question of the  
Animal, due for publication in Spring 2010 by Liverpool University  
Press. My thanks to the English Department’s lecture committee for  
their support in helping me mount this event.

Finally, the 30th Annual Eaton Conference, on the topic of “Global  
Science Fiction,” will be held in Riverside on February 11-13, 2011.  
The conference committee—consisting of me, Mark Bould (University of  
the West of England), Melissa Conway (Head, UCR Special Collections  
and Archives), Pawel Frelik (Marie Curie-Sklodowska University,  
Poland), M. Elizabeth Ginway (University of Florida), Howard Hendrix  
(CSU-Fresno), George Slusser (Eaton Curator Emeritus), Takayuki  
Tatsumi (Keio University, Tokyo), and Sherryl Vint (Brock University,  
Ontario)—is in the process of drafting a Call for Papers that will be  
circulated and posted by February 1, with a likely submission date for  
paper abstracts of June or July 2010. The CFP should also include  
information about attending writers, including the Guest of Honor, who  
will receive the Third J. Lloyd Eaton Award for Lifetime Achievement  
in Science Fiction—the first two having been bestowed on Ray Bradbury  
and Frederik Pohl. UCR Professor of Creative Writing Mike Davis, whose  
many works have explored links between social history and popular  
culture, has agreed to give the keynote address. The new Science  
Fiction and Fantasy Translation Awards will also be debuting at the  
conference (see the award homepage at <http://www.sfftawards.org/> for  
more information).The conference will be held, for the first time  
ever, at the historic Mission Inn hotel.
These events, and others still in the planning stages, will affirm  
UCR’s reputation as an international center of science fiction  
scholarship, even amidst the draconian budget cuts and general  
malaise. I hope you can join us for some or all of them!

Rob Latham






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