My Worldcon / ConZealand Schedule
Things have been extraordinarily busy in the Duke compound. I’m buying a house. I finished an online college argument course. And now I find myself prepping for a whole semester of virtual classes. Thus, I have no posted much here in the last few weeks. The good news? I’ve got a ConZealand schedule to share. To add things to your ConZealand schedule, you can find all my items here in Grenadine. I’ve also included the list below w/ U.S. times. There are panels, like Skiffy and Fanty Show shenanigans, and more. So please come! Here’s the schedule: “Magical Realism in Genre” — Tuesday (7/28) at 6 PM EST / 5 PM CST / 3 PM PST (10 AM on 7/29 in NZ)Magic realism has highlighted inner life when confronted with harsh reality, with a turn of a kaleidoscope,. Given the how magic realism works within interstitial spaces of ordinary life, can it slip into genres that already require a suspension of disbelief? (w/ Eli K.P. William, Silvia Brown, and *hopefully* Libia Brenda) “Recent SF and Fantasy on TV: Beyond the Usual Suspects” — Wednesday (7/29) at 5 PM EST / 4 PM CST / 2 PM PST (9 AM on 7/30 in NZ)Talk of SF and fantasy on TV and streaming services often centers on Star Trek, Doctor Who, Game of Thrones and the Expanse. But there is so much more. Westworld. Stranger Things. Counterpart. The Good Place. The DC and Marvel Universe Shows. Star Wars (The Clone Wars, The Madalorian). The Witcher. What’s really good? (w/ Juliana Rew, Stina Leicht, Christine Taylor-Butler, and possibly another) “The Golden Age of SF Movies: SF Films of the 1950s and Early 1960s” — Wednesday (7/29) at 12 AM EST / 11 PM CST / 9 PM PST (4 PM on 7/30 in NZ)Soon after World War II, as the Cold War introduced chilling new threats to the world’s peace of mind — Hollywood (and Tokyo) launched an avalanche of SF and monster-related movies. Was this a golden age? Or were these flicks mostly cheap shockers that kept recycling variations on the theme of “Monster Attacks!”? (w/ Dr. Bradford Lyau, Mallory O’Meara, and Ion “The Skiffy and Fanty Show Podcast (LIVE)” — Thursday (7/30) at 4 PM EST / 3 PM CST / 1 PM PST (8 AM on 7/31 in NZ)Join us for a discussion of the Netflix film The Old Guard & comic book adaptations. (w/ Jen Zink and Alasdair Stuart) “History and SF” — Thursday (7/30) at 9 PM EST / 8 PM CST / 6 PM PST (1 PM on 7/31 in NZ)Phil Klass (William Tenn) once said that the real science of science fiction is history. Many great SF works get much of their strength because the history — implicit or explicit — behind the story feels real. How do writers manage this? How can real history be made to work in a story? What are some examples? (w/ Arkady Martine, Dr. Farah Mendlesohn, Claire Bartlett, and Ada Palmer) “Kaffeeklatsch: Shaun Duke and Jen Zink” — Friday (7/31) at 10 PM EST / 9 PM CST / 7 PM PST (2 PM on 8/1 in NZ)In which Jen and I will sit in a Zoom meeting to talk about podcasting, nerdery, and whatever else you want to pester us with. Come hang with us! We might have beer…for us. Sorry. We can’t share over video… And there you have it. My schedule. I hope to see y’all there!
“Finding Hope”: The History Reading List
Not too long ago, I announced a little project called “Finding Hope in the Histories of the United States.” I set as a goal to begin with a series of general histories of the United States to see if understanding the full line of this country’s history can change how I understand the concept of “hope.” And now that project can finally begin! For the past few weeks, I’ve been waiting on the books I selected for the project to arrive. More particularly, the first two books in the chronology (listed below and shown at the top of the image). All the others got here in record time, but for some reason, the books I needed to even begin took a little extra time. But now the wait is over. Here’s the magic reading list for the first phase of “Finding Hope”:
Project Announcement: Finding Hope in the Histories of the United States
Hope is hard to come by these days. The pandemic continues to take lives by the thousands, the U.S. political system is (at best) totally broken, Americans left and right hate one another and seem frequently incapable of agreeing on even the most agreeable things, and the various aspects of Civil Rights have not been realized. For many Americans, it all seems…hopeless. These are the same feelings I’ve experienced since 2016 on an almost daily basis. There’s this never ending sense that we live in a dystopian nightmare for which there is no end in sight. This is not helped by endless news cycles of terror and apathy and political punditry, by our social media cycles of misery, or even at the local level of politics. Hell, my small town made the news for being one of the first cities to vote to ban refugee resettlements. But is it really that hopeless? Is hope truly dead, or is there a a trend of hope throughout U.S. history that we’re ignoring? I’d like to find out.
The Blog Challenge Project Begins!
Yesterday, I put some feelers out to see if folks would be interested in a collective of bloggers and booktubers to support and encourage one another to create new content. And if the existence of this post is any indication, a lot of folks responded! So, I’m officially announcing this here: The Blog Challenge Project begins! What is the Blog Challenge Project? In short, the project aims to create a community of bloggers and booktubers who will encourage one another to create content, support one another in their blogging ventures, and provide a giant list of prompts and ideas for posts that folks can complete on their own time or challenge one another to explore. The idea is to provide some positivity and community in a time of immense stress. You can click the link to read the full info page and see our current list of prompts! Anyone may join the project, either by tagging along or requesting to be part of the official pages, which comes with access to a special Discord server! So who is going to get involved?
Worldcon 2019 (Dublin): My Schedule and Other Shenanigans
Well well. It’s been a long time since I’ve posted here. I have been a busy bee, from moving to the northwest corner of Minnesota to a new job to writing a textbook to partly semi-producing a podcast. Yup. Busy. And that means I’ve neglected this blog along with a lot of other things.. Sadface. Speaking of podcasts: The Skiffy and Fanty Show is once more a Hugo Award finalist. Ballots are submitted, so we’ll find out if we’re winners in about 2 weeks. Wish us luck! And since I am part of that show, I’ll be at Worldcon in Dublin. As the title of this post suggests, that’s what I’m here to talk about today. As it turns out, I’m on programming at Worldcon, which means some of you might have the opportunity to hear me babble about a variety of topics. With that in mind, here’s my schedule for the event: The use of SF in higher education 17 Aug 2019, Saturday 15:00 – 15:50, Wicklow Room-2 (CCD) Professors from different disciplines discuss the possible uses of speculative fiction as a tool for teaching. From humanities to sciences via legal studies, how have academics used SFF in the classroom in the past, and how can we dream of speculative fiction – and the technology it posits! – being used in future? Panelists: Mary Anne Mohanraj (M), Nora E. Derrington, David DeGraff, Dr. Shaun Duke, Corry L. Lee Ph.D. (corry.lee@gmail.com) Literary Beer: Dr Shaun Duke 17 Aug 2019, Saturday 17:00 – 17:50, Liffey-A (Fan Bar) (CCD) Basically, you can come talk to me while having a beer, water, or air. For 50 minutes. So please come say hello. Please! Academics and acolytes: learning in SFF worlds 18 Aug 2019, Sunday 12:30 – 13:20, Odeon 4 (Point Square Dublin) Whether they’re apprenticed to an assassin, a grunt in basic training, downloading knowledge from an online academy, or learning spells from wizardly professors, characters often need to gain skills and qualifications of some kind. How and when they do this is an important element of worldbuilding and there are endless options. What does it tell us about the Discworld that wizards attend university and witches are apprentices? How does Starfleet Academy differ from the Imperial Academy? From Hogwarts to Brakebills to the Oha Coven, how does magical instruction differ? Panelists: Dr. Shaun Duke (M), Karen Simpson Nikakis, Prof. Kenneth Schneyer, Ali Baker Fan podcasts 18 Aug 2019, Sunday 15:30 – 16:20, Odeon 5 (Point Square Dublin) Podcasts have become a popular way to talk about and hear about our fannish favourites, share the latest theories and plot developments, and find new things to love. Our panelists discuss the challenges and delights of podcasting, and help you find new podcasts to check out. Panelists: Heather Rose Jones (M), Alexandra Rowland, Dr. Shaun Duke, Jonathan Strahan, Jen Zink I’ll also be in attendance for the Hugo rehearsals and the Hugo Awards proper. I don’t expect to do much more than clapping for the latter event, but you never know! Beyond these events (please come!), I’ll also be hard at work on various other podcast activities throughout the convention AND some Dublin shenanigans around those days. Speaking of podcast activities: if you’re a creative type with a nifty project to talk about OR a fan with a cool blog, podcast, or other super fan thing to plug, get in touch at skiffyandfanty[at]gmail[dot]com OR via Twitter DM @SkiffyandFanty. We’re interested in interviewing folks! Anywho. That’s all for now. Hopefully, I can get back into this blogging thing again…soon.
Mastodon and My Happy “Project”
I just joined Mastodon. I’m also on the wandering.shop “instance,” too. Yup, you can follow me in two places. So what the heck is Mastodon? It’s sort of like Twitter, but it allows people to create their own “instances” (or sub-communities) with their own guidelines, etc., effectively making it an answer to the hellhole of infinity that is Twitter. From what I can tell, a lot of creative types, especially from marginalized communities, have joined to escape Twitter’s endlessly disappointing reaction to rampant abuse and bigotry on its platform. Whether they’re leaving permanently or just taking more of their energy elsewhere, the vibe seems pretty clear: it’s kind of a joyful zone.