Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible (or at least non-supernatural) content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities. Exploring the consequences of scientific innovations is one purpose of science fiction, making it a "literature of ideas".[1]
Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures.[2] It is similar to, but differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature (though some elements in a story might still be pure imaginative speculation).
The settings for science fiction are often contrary to known reality, but most science fiction relies on a considerable degree of suspension of disbelief, which is facilitated in the reader's mind by potential scientific explanations or solutions to various fictional elements. Science fiction elements include:
A time setting in the future, in alternative timelines, or in a historical past that contradicts known facts of history or the archaeological record.
A spatial setting or scenes in outer space (e.g., spaceflight), on other worlds, or on subterranean earth.[3]
Characters that include aliens, mutants, androids, or humanoid robots.
Technology that is futuristic (e.g., ray guns, teleportation machines, humanoid computers).[4]
Scientific principles that are new or that contradict known laws of nature, for example time travel, wormholes, or faster-than-light travel.
New and different political or social systems (e.g. dystopia, post-scarcity, or a post-apocalyptic situation where organized society has collapsed).[5]
Paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, telekinesis, and teleportation.
Other universes or dimensions and travel between them.
History
As a means of understanding the world through speculation and storytelling, science fiction has antecedents back to mythology, though precursors to science fiction as literature can be seen in Lucian's True History in the 2nd century,[12][13][14][15][16] some of the Arabian Nights tales,[17][18] The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter in the 10th century[18] and Ibn al-Nafis' Theologus Autodidactus in the 13th century[19].
A product of the budding Age of Reason and the development of modern science itself, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels[20] was one of the first true science fantasy works, together with Voltaire's Micromégas (1752) and Johannes Kepler's Somnium (1620–1630).[21] Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan consider the latter work the first science fiction story.[22][23] It depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there. Another example is Ludvig Holberg's novel Nicolai Klimii iter subterraneum, 1741. (Translated to Danish by Hans Hagerup in 1742 as Niels Klims underjordiske Rejse.) (Eng. Niels Klim's Underground Travels.) Brian Aldiss has argued that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818) was the first work of science fiction.[24]
Following the 18th-century development of the novel as a literary form, in the early 19th century, Mary Shelley's books Frankenstein and The Last Man helped define the form of the science fiction novel;[25] later Edgar Allan Poe wrote a story about a flight to the moon.[26] More examples appeared throughout the 19th century.
H. G. Wells
Then with the dawn of new technologies such as electricity, the telegraph, and new forms of powered transportation, writers including Jules Verne and H. G. Wells created a body of work that became popular across broad cross-sections of society.[27] Wells' The War of the Worlds describes an invasion of late Victorian England by Martians using tripod fighting machines equipped with advanced weaponry. It is a seminal depiction of an alien invasion of Earth.
In the late 19th century, the term "scientific romance" was used in Britain to describe much of this fiction. This produced additional offshoots, such as the 1884 novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott Abbott. The term would continue to be used into the early 20th century for writers such as Olaf Stapledon.
Jules Verne
In the early 20th century, pulp magazines helped develop a new generation of mainly American SF writers, influenced by Hugo Gernsback, the founder of Amazing Stories magazine.[28] In 1912 Edgar Rice Burroughs published A Princess of Mars, the first of his three-decade-long series of Barsoom novels, situated on Mars and featuring John Carter as the hero. The 1928 publication of Philip Nolan's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419, in Amazing Stories was a landmark event. This story led to comic strips featuring Buck Rogers (1929), Brick Bradford (1933), and Flash Gordon (1934). The comic strips and derivative movie serials greatly popularized science fiction. In the late 1930s, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, and a critical mass of new writers emerged in New York City in a group called the Futurians, including Isaac Asimov, Damon Knight, Donald A. Wollheim, Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Judith Merril, and others.[29] Other important writers during this period included E.E. (Doc) Smith, Robert A. Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Olaf Stapledon, A. E. van Vogt and Stanisław Lem. Campbell's tenure at Astounding is considered to be the beginning of the Golden Age of science fiction, characterized by hard SF stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress.[28] This lasted until postwar technological advances, new magazines such as Galaxy under Pohl as editor, and a new generation of writers began writing stories outside the Campbell mode.
In the 1950s, the Beat generation included speculative writers such as William S. Burroughs. In the 1960s and early 1970s, writers like Frank Herbert, Samuel R. Delany, Roger Zelazny, and Harlan Ellison explored new trends, ideas, and writing styles, while a group of writers, mainly in Britain, became known as the New Wave for their embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously "literary" or artistic sensibility.[20] In the 1970s, writers like Larry Niven and Poul Anderson began to redefine hard SF.[30] Ursula K. Le Guin and others pioneered soft science fiction.[31]
In the 1980s, cyberpunk authors like William Gibson turned away from the optimism and support for progress of traditional science fiction.[32] The Star Wars franchise helped spark a new interest in space opera,[33] focusing more on story and character than on scientific accuracy. C. J. Cherryh's detailed explorations of alien life and complex scientific challenges influenced a generation of writers.[34] Emerging themes in the 1990s included environmental issues, the implications of the global Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology and nanotechnology, as well as a post-Cold War interest in post-scarcity societies; Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age comprehensively explores these themes. Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan novels brought the character-driven story back into prominence.[35] The television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) began a torrent of new SF shows, including three further Star Trek spin-off shows and Babylon 5.[36][37] Concern about the rapid pace of technological change crystallized around the concept of the technological singularity, popularized by Vernor Vinge's novel Marooned in Realtime and then taken up by other authors.
The term "sci-fi"
Forrest J Ackerman used the term sci-fi (analogous to the then-trendy "hi-fi") at UCLA in 1954.[38] As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies" and with low-quality pulp science fiction.[39][40][41] By the 1970s, critics within the field such as Terry Carr and Damon Knight were using sci-fi to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction,[42] and around 1978, Susan Wood and others introduced the pronunciation "skiffy". Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers".[43] David Langford's monthly fanzine Ansible includes a regular section "As Others See Us" which offers numerous examples of "sci-fi" being used in a pejorative sense by people outside the genre.[44]
[edit] Innovation
While SF has provided criticism of developing and future technologies, it also produces innovation and new technology. The discussion of this topic has occurred more in literary and sociological than in scientific forums. Cinema and media theorist Vivian Sobchack examines the dialogue between science fiction film and the technological imagination. Technology impacts artists and how they portray their fictionalized subjects, but the fictional world gives back to science by broadening imagination. While more prevalent in the beginning years of science fiction with writers like Arthur C. Clarke, new authors still find ways to make the currently impossible technologies seem closer to being realized.[45]
[edit] Subgenres
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction genre.
A categorization of science fiction into various subgenres can be problematic, because these subcategories are not simple pigeonholes. Some works may overlap two or more commonly defined genres, whereas others are beyond the generic boundaries, either outside or between categories. Moreover, the categories and genres used by mass markets and literary criticism differ considerably. One example that straddles science fiction subgenres is Elizabeth Moon's Vatta's War series, which has been described by many as military science fiction but also has elements of space opera.
[edit] Hard SF
Main article: Hard science fiction
Arthur C. Clarke
Hard science fiction, or "hard SF", is characterized by rigorous attention to accurate detail in quantitative sciences, especially physics, astrophysics, and chemistry, or on accurately depicting worlds that more advanced technology may make possible. Many accurate predictions of the future come from the hard science fiction subgenre, but numerous inaccurate predictions have emerged as well.[citation needed] Some hard SF authors have distinguished themselves as working scientists, including Gregory Benford, Geoffrey A. Landis and David Brin,[46][47] while mathematician authors include Rudy Rucker and Vernor Vinge. Other noteworthy hard SF authors include Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Hal Clement, Greg Bear, Larry Niven, Robert J. Sawyer, Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Charles Sheffield, Ben Bova, Kim Stanley Robinson and Greg Egan.
[edit] Soft and social SF
Main article: Soft science fiction
The description "soft" science fiction may describe works based on social sciences such as psychology, economics, political science, sociology, and anthropology. Noteworthy writers in this category include Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick.[28][48] The term can describe stories focused primarily on character and emotion; SFWA Grand Master Ray Bradbury was an acknowledged master of this art.[49] The Eastern Bloc produced a large quantity of social science fiction, including works by Polish authors Stanislaw Lem and Janusz Zajdel, as well as Soviet authors such as the Strugatsky brothers, Kir Bulychov, Yevgeny Zamyatin and Ivan Yefremov.[50][51] Some writers blur the boundary between hard and soft science fiction.[52]
Related to social SF and soft SF are utopian and dystopian stories; George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale are examples. Satirical novels with fantastic settings such as Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift may also be considered science fiction or speculative fiction.
[edit] Cyberpunk
Main article: Cyberpunk
The cyberpunk genre emerged in the early 1980s; combining cybernetics and punk,[53] the term was coined by author Bruce Bethke for his 1980 short story "Cyberpunk".[54] The time frame is usually near-future and the settings are often dystopian in nature and characterized by misery. Common themes in cyberpunk include advances in information technology and especially the Internet, visually abstracted as cyberspace, artificial intelligence and prosthetics and post-democratic societal control where corporations have more influence than governments. Nihilism, post-modernism, and film noir techniques are common elements, and the protagonists may be disaffected or reluctant anti-heroes. Noteworthy authors in this genre are William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, and Pat Cadigan. James O'Ehley has called the 1982 film Blade Runner a definitive example of the cyberpunk visual style.[55]
[edit] Time travel
Time travel stories have antecedents in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first major time travel novel was Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. The most famous is H. G. Wells's 1895 novel The Time Machine, which uses a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposefully and selectively, while Twain's time traveler is struck in the head. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now universally used to refer to such a vehicle. Stories of this type are complicated by logical problems such as the grandfather paradox.[56] Time travel continues to be a popular subject in modern science fiction, in print, movies, and television such as the BBC television series Doctor Who.
[edit] Alternate history
Main article: Alternate history
Alternate (or alternative) history stories are based on the premise that historical events might have turned out differently. These stories may use time travel to change the past, or may simply set a story in a universe with a different history from our own. Classics in the genre include Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore, in which the South wins the American Civil War, and The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick, in which Germany and Japan win World War II. The Sidewise Award acknowledges the best works in this subgenre; the name is taken from Murray Leinster's 1934 story "Sidewise in Time." Harry Turtledove is one of the most prominent authors in the subgenre and is sometimes called the "master of alternate history".[57][58]
[edit] Military SF
Main article: Military science fiction
Military science fiction is set in the context of conflict between national, interplanetary, or interstellar armed forces; the primary viewpoint characters are usually soldiers. Stories include detail about military technology, procedure, ritual, and history; military stories may use parallels with historical conflicts. Heinlein's Starship Troopers is an early example, along with the Dorsai novels of Gordon Dickson. Joe Haldeman's The Forever War is a critique of the genre, a Vietnam-era response to the World War II–style stories of earlier authors.[59] Prominent military SF authors include John Ringo, David Drake, David Weber, and S. M. Stirling. The publishing company Baen Books is known for cultivating military science fiction authors.[60]
[edit] Superhuman
Superhuman stories deal with the emergence of humans who have abilities beyond the norm. This can stem either from natural causes such as in Olaf Stapledon's novel Odd John, and Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human, or be the result of intentional augmentation such as in A. E. van Vogt's novel Slan. These stories usually focus on the alienation that these beings feel as well as society's reaction to them. These stories have played a role in the real life discussion of human enhancement. Frederik Pohl's Man Plus also belongs to this category.
[edit] Apocalyptic
Main article: Apocalyptic fiction
Apocalyptic fiction is concerned with the end of civilization through war (On the Beach), pandemic (The Last Man), astronomic impact (When Worlds Collide), ecological disaster (The Wind from Nowhere), or some other general disaster or with a world or civilization after such a disaster. Typical of the genre are George R. Stewart's novel Earth Abides and Pat Frank's novel Alas, Babylon. Apocalyptic fiction generally concerns the disaster itself and the direct aftermath, while post-apocalyptic can deal with anything from the near aftermath (as in Cormac McCarthy's The Road) to 375 years in the future (as in By The Waters of Babylon) to hundreds or thousands of years in the future, as in Russell Hoban's novel Riddley Walker and Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz.
[edit] Space opera
Main article: Space opera
Space opera is adventure science fiction set in outer space or on distant planets. The conflict is heroic, and typically on a large scale.
Space opera is sometimes used pejoratively, to describe improbable plots, absurd science, and cardboard characters. But it is also used nostalgically, and modern space opera may be an attempt to recapture the sense of wonder of the golden age of science fiction. The pioneer of this subgenre is generally recognized to be Edward E. (Doc) Smith, with his Skylark and Lensman series. The Star Trek television series franchise is often described as space opera that encourages this sense of wonder, in that most of the scripts are generally about peaceful space exploration and examinations of cultural differences rather than about conflict between civilizations. Alastair Reynolds's Revelation Space series, Peter F. Hamilton's Void, Night's Dawn and Pandora's Star series, and Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky are newer examples of this genre.
[edit] Space Western
Main article: Space western
Space Western could be considered a sub-genre of space opera that transposes themes of the American Western books and film to a backdrop of futuristic space frontiers. These stories typically involve "frontier" colony worlds (colonies that have only recently been terraformed and/or settled) serving as stand-ins for the backdrop of lawlessness and economic expansion that were predominant in the American west. Examples include the Sean Connery film Outland, the Firefly television series, and the film sequel Serenity by Joss Whedon, as well as the manga and anime series Trigun, Outlaw Star, and Cowboy Bebop.
[edit] Other sub-genres
This section requires expansion. (June 2008)
Anthropological science fiction is a sub-genre that absorbs and discusses anthropology and the study of human kind. Examples include Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer, and Neanderthal by John Darnton.
Biopunk focuses on biotechnology and subversives.
Comic science fiction is a sub-genre that exploits the genre's conventions for comic effect.
Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender and the unequal political and personal power of men and women. Some of the most notable feminist science fiction works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.[61] Joanna Russ's work, and some of Ursula Le Guin's work can be thus categorised.
Science fiction poetry is an overlooked and under-discussed sub-category of science fiction. As Seo-Young Chu remarks in her 2011 book Do Metaphors Dream of Literal Sleep? A Science-Fictional Theory of Representation, science fiction is not often (enough) thought of as a genre related to lyric poetry. But as Chu points out, there are plenty of examples of science fiction poetry and verse by writers including Diane Ackerman, Emily Dickinson, Suzette Haden Elgin (who founded the Science Fiction Poetry Association and authored The Science Fiction Poetry Handbook), Ruth Fainlight, Robert Frazier, Cathy Park Hong, Andrew Joron, and Frederick Turner, among many others. Chu also points out that lyricism is an overlooked yet overwhelming presence in science fiction novels, stories, and films.[62]
Steampunk is based on the idea of futuristic technology existing in the past, usually the 19th century, and often set in Victorian era England—but with prominent elements of either science fiction or fantasy, such as fictional technological inventions like those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, or real technological developments like the computer occurring at an earlier date. Popular examples include The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, as well as the Girl Genius series by Phil and Kaja Foglio, although seeds of the genre may be seen in certain works of Michael Moorcock, Philip Jose Farmer and Steve Stiles, and in such games as Space 1889 and Marcus Rowland's Forgotten Futures. Machines are most often powered by steam in this genre (hence the name).
Dieselpunk takes over where Steampunk leaves off. These are stories that take over as we usher in the machine-heavy eras of WWI and WWII. The use of diesel-powered machines plays heavily. In this (like its steam counterpart), the focus is on the technology.
[edit] Related genres
[edit] Speculative fiction, fantasy, and horror
For more details on this topic, see speculative fiction.
The broader category of speculative fiction[63] includes science fiction, fantasy, alternate histories (which may have no particular scientific or futuristic component), and even literary stories that contain fantastic elements, such as the work of Jorge Luis Borges or John Barth. For some editors, magic realism is considered to be within the broad definition of speculative fiction.[64]
[edit] Fantasy
Main article: Fantasy
Fantasy is closely associated with science fiction, and many writers have worked in both genres, while writers such as Anne McCaffrey, Ursula K. LeGuin, and Marion Zimmer Bradley have written works that appear to blur the boundary between the two related genres.[65] The authors' professional organization is called the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA).[66] SF conventions routinely have programming on fantasy topics,[67][68][69] and fantasy authors such as J. K. Rowling have won the highest honor within the science fiction field, the Hugo Award.[70]
In general, science fiction differs from fantasy in that the former concerns things that might someday be possible or that at least embody the pretense of realism. Supernaturalism, usually absent in science fiction, is the distinctive characteristic of fantasy literature. A dictionary definition referring to fantasy literature is "fiction characterized by highly fanciful or supernatural elements." [71] Examples of fantasy supernaturalism include magic (spells, harm to opponents), magical places (Narnia, Oz, Middle Earth, Hogwarts), supernatural creatures (witches, vampires, orcs, trolls), supernatural transportation (flying broomsticks, ruby slippers, windows between worlds), and shapeshifting (beast into man, man into wolf or bear, lion into sheep). Such things are basic themes in fantasy.[72] Literary critic Fredric Jameson has characterized the difference between the two genres by describing science fiction as turning "on a formal framework determined by concepts of the mode of production rather than those of religion" - that is, science fiction texts are bound by an inner logic based more on historical materialism than on magic or the forces of good and evil.[73] Some narratives are described as being essentially science fiction but "with fantasy elements". The term "science fantasy" is sometimes used to describe such material.[74]
[edit] Horror fiction
Main article: Horror fiction
Horror fiction is the literature of the unnatural and supernatural, with the aim of unsettling or frightening the reader, sometimes with graphic violence. Historically it has also been known as weird fiction. Although horror is not per se a branch of science fiction, many works of horror literature incorporates science fictional elements. One of the defining classical works of horror, Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, is the first fully realized work of science fiction, where the manufacture of the monster is given a rigorous science-fictional grounding. The works of Edgar Allan Poe also helped define both the science fiction and the horror genres.[75] Today horror is one of the most popular categories of films.[76] Horror is often mistakenly categorized as science fiction at the point of distribution by libraries, video rental outlets, etc. For example, Syfy (distributed via cable and satellite television in the United States) currently devotes most its air time to horror films with very few science fiction titles.[citation needed]
[edit] Mystery fiction
Main article: Mystery fiction
Works in which science and technology are a dominant theme, but based on current reality, may be considered mainstream fiction. Much of the thriller genre would be included, such as the novels of Tom Clancy or Michael Crichton, or the James Bond films.[77] Modernist works from writers like Kurt Vonnegut, Philip K. Dick, and Stanisław Lem have focused on speculative or existential perspectives on contemporary reality and are on the borderline between SF and the mainstream.[78] According to Robert J. Sawyer, "Science fiction and mystery have a great deal in common. Both prize the intellectual process of puzzle solving, and both require stories to be plausible and hinge on the way things really do work."[79] Isaac Asimov, Walter Mosley, and other writers incorporate mystery elements in their science fiction, and vice versa.
[edit] Superhero fiction
Main article: Superhero fiction
Superhero fiction is a genre characterized by beings with much higher than usual capability and prowess, generally with a desire or need to help the citizens of their chosen country or world by using his or her powers to defeat natural or superpowered threats. Many superhero fiction characters involve themselves (either intentionally or accidentally) with science fiction and fact, including advanced technologies, alien worlds, time travel, and interdimensional travel; but the standards of scientific plausibility are lower than with actual science fiction. Authors of this genre include Stan Lee (co-creator of Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and the Hulk); Marv Wolfman, the creator of Blade for Marvel Comics, and The New Teen Titans for DC Comics; Dean Wesley Smith (Smallville, Spider-Man, and X-Men novels) and Superman writers Roger Stern and Elliot S! Maggin.
[edit] Fandom and community
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction fandom.
Science fiction fandom is the "community of the literature of ideas... the culture in which new ideas emerge and grow before being released into society at large".[80] Members of this community, "fans", are in contact with each other at conventions or clubs, through print or online fanzines, or on the Internet using web sites, mailing lists, and other resources.
SF fandom emerged from the letters column in Amazing Stories magazine. Soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines.[81] Once they were in regular contact, fans wanted to meet each other, and they organized local clubs. In the 1930s, the first science fiction conventions gathered fans from a wider area.[82] Conventions, clubs, and fanzines were the dominant form of fan activity, or "fanac", for decades, until the Internet facilitated communication among a much larger population of interested people.
[edit] Awards
For more details on this topic, see List of science fiction awards.
Among the most respected awards for science fiction are the Hugo Award, presented by the World Science Fiction Society at Worldcon; the Nebula Award, presented by SFWA and voted on by the community of authors; and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for short fiction. One notable award for science fiction films is the Saturn Award. It is presented annually by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films.
There are national awards, like Canada's Aurora Award, regional awards, like the Endeavour Award presented at Orycon for works from the Pacific Northwest, special interest or subgenre awards like the Chesley Award for art or the World Fantasy Award for fantasy. Magazines may organize reader polls, notably the Locus Award.
[edit] Conventions, clubs, and organizations
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction conventions.
Pamela Dean reading at Minicon
Conventions (in fandom, shortened as "cons"), are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership. General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, etc. Most are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters. The convention's activities are called the "program", which may include panel discussions, readings, autograph sessions, costume masquerades, and other events. Activities that occur throughout the convention are not part of the program; these commonly include a dealer's room, art show, and hospitality lounge (or "con suites").[83]
Conventions may host award ceremonies; Worldcons present the Hugo Awards each year. SF societies, referred to as "clubs" except in formal contexts, form a year-round base of activities for science fiction fans. They may be associated with an ongoing science fiction convention, or have regular club meetings, or both. Most groups meet in libraries, schools and universities, community centers, pubs or restaurants, or the homes of individual members. Long-established groups like the New England Science Fiction Association and the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society have clubhouses for meetings and storage of convention supplies and research materials.[84] The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) was founded by Damon Knight in 1965 as a non-profit organization to serve the community of professional science fiction authors,[66] 24 years after his essay "Unite or Fie!" had led to the organization of the National Fantasy Fan Federation. Fandom has helped incubate related groups, including media fandom,[85] the Society for Creative Anachronism,[86] gaming,[87] filking, and furry fandom.
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible (or at least non-supernatural) content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities. Exploring the consequences of scientific innovations is one purpose of science fiction, making it a "literature of ideas".[1]
Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures.[2] It is similar to, but differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature (though some elements in a story might still be pure imaginative speculation).
The settings for science fiction are often contrary to known reality, but most science fiction relies on a considerable degree of suspension of disbelief, which is facilitated in the reader's mind by potential scientific explanations or solutions to various fictional elements. Science fiction elements include:
A time setting in the future, in alternative timelines, or in a historical past that contradicts known facts of history or the archaeological record.
A spatial setting or scenes in outer space (e.g., spaceflight), on other worlds, or on subterranean earth.[3]
Characters that include aliens, mutants, androids, or humanoid robots.
Technology that is futuristic (e.g., ray guns, teleportation machines, humanoid computers).[4]
Scientific principles that are new or that contradict known laws of nature, for example time travel, wormholes, or faster-than-light travel.
New and different political or social systems (e.g. dystopia, post-scarcity, or a post-apocalyptic situation where organized society has collapsed).[5]
Paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, telekinesis, and teleportation.
Other universes or dimensions and travel between them.
History
As a means of understanding the world through speculation and storytelling, science fiction has antecedents back to mythology, though precursors to science fiction as literature can be seen in Lucian's True History in the 2nd century,[12][13][14][15][16] some of the Arabian Nights tales,[17][18] The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter in the 10th century[18] and Ibn al-Nafis' Theologus Autodidactus in the 13th century[19].
A product of the budding Age of Reason and the development of modern science itself, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels[20] was one of the first true science fantasy works, together with Voltaire's Micromégas (1752) and Johannes Kepler's Somnium (1620–1630).[21] Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan consider the latter work the first science fiction story.[22][23] It depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there. Another example is Ludvig Holberg's novel Nicolai Klimii iter subterraneum, 1741. (Translated to Danish by Hans Hagerup in 1742 as Niels Klims underjordiske Rejse.) (Eng. Niels Klim's Underground Travels.) Brian Aldiss has argued that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818) was the first work of science fiction.[24]
Following the 18th-century development of the novel as a literary form, in the early 19th century, Mary Shelley's books Frankenstein and The Last Man helped define the form of the science fiction novel;[25] later Edgar Allan Poe wrote a story about a flight to the moon.[26] More examples appeared throughout the 19th century.
H. G. Wells
Then with the dawn of new technologies such as electricity, the telegraph, and new forms of powered transportation, writers including Jules Verne and H. G. Wells created a body of work that became popular across broad cross-sections of society.[27] Wells' The War of the Worlds describes an invasion of late Victorian England by Martians using tripod fighting machines equipped with advanced weaponry. It is a seminal depiction of an alien invasion of Earth.
In the late 19th century, the term "scientific romance" was used in Britain to describe much of this fiction. This produced additional offshoots, such as the 1884 novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott Abbott. The term would continue to be used into the early 20th century for writers such as Olaf Stapledon.
Jules Verne
In the early 20th century, pulp magazines helped develop a new generation of mainly American SF writers, influenced by Hugo Gernsback, the founder of Amazing Stories magazine.[28] In 1912 Edgar Rice Burroughs published A Princess of Mars, the first of his three-decade-long series of Barsoom novels, situated on Mars and featuring John Carter as the hero. The 1928 publication of Philip Nolan's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419, in Amazing Stories was a landmark event. This story led to comic strips featuring Buck Rogers (1929), Brick Bradford (1933), and Flash Gordon (1934). The comic strips and derivative movie serials greatly popularized science fiction. In the late 1930s, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, and a critical mass of new writers emerged in New York City in a group called the Futurians, including Isaac Asimov, Damon Knight, Donald A. Wollheim, Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Judith Merril, and others.[29] Other important writers during this period included E.E. (Doc) Smith, Robert A. Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Olaf Stapledon, A. E. van Vogt and Stanisław Lem. Campbell's tenure at Astounding is considered to be the beginning of the Golden Age of science fiction, characterized by hard SF stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress.[28] This lasted until postwar technological advances, new magazines such as Galaxy under Pohl as editor, and a new generation of writers began writing stories outside the Campbell mode.
In the 1950s, the Beat generation included speculative writers such as William S. Burroughs. In the 1960s and early 1970s, writers like Frank Herbert, Samuel R. Delany, Roger Zelazny, and Harlan Ellison explored new trends, ideas, and writing styles, while a group of writers, mainly in Britain, became known as the New Wave for their embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously "literary" or artistic sensibility.[20] In the 1970s, writers like Larry Niven and Poul Anderson began to redefine hard SF.[30] Ursula K. Le Guin and others pioneered soft science fiction.[31]
In the 1980s, cyberpunk authors like William Gibson turned away from the optimism and support for progress of traditional science fiction.[32] The Star Wars franchise helped spark a new interest in space opera,[33] focusing more on story and character than on scientific accuracy. C. J. Cherryh's detailed explorations of alien life and complex scientific challenges influenced a generation of writers.[34] Emerging themes in the 1990s included environmental issues, the implications of the global Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology and nanotechnology, as well as a post-Cold War interest in post-scarcity societies; Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age comprehensively explores these themes. Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan novels brought the character-driven story back into prominence.[35] The television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) began a torrent of new SF shows, including three further Star Trek spin-off shows and Babylon 5.[36][37] Concern about the rapid pace of technological change crystallized around the concept of the technological singularity, popularized by Vernor Vinge's novel Marooned in Realtime and then taken up by other authors.
The term "sci-fi"
Forrest J Ackerman used the term sci-fi (analogous to the then-trendy "hi-fi") at UCLA in 1954.[38] As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies" and with low-quality pulp science fiction.[39][40][41] By the 1970s, critics within the field such as Terry Carr and Damon Knight were using sci-fi to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction,[42] and around 1978, Susan Wood and others introduced the pronunciation "skiffy". Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers".[43] David Langford's monthly fanzine Ansible includes a regular section "As Others See Us" which offers numerous examples of "sci-fi" being used in a pejorative sense by people outside the genre.[44]
[edit] Innovation
While SF has provided criticism of developing and future technologies, it also produces innovation and new technology. The discussion of this topic has occurred more in literary and sociological than in scientific forums. Cinema and media theorist Vivian Sobchack examines the dialogue between science fiction film and the technological imagination. Technology impacts artists and how they portray their fictionalized subjects, but the fictional world gives back to science by broadening imagination. While more prevalent in the beginning years of science fiction with writers like Arthur C. Clarke, new authors still find ways to make the currently impossible technologies seem closer to being realized.[45]
[edit] Subgenres
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction genre.
A categorization of science fiction into various subgenres can be problematic, because these subcategories are not simple pigeonholes. Some works may overlap two or more commonly defined genres, whereas others are beyond the generic boundaries, either outside or between categories. Moreover, the categories and genres used by mass markets and literary criticism differ considerably. One example that straddles science fiction subgenres is Elizabeth Moon's Vatta's War series, which has been described by many as military science fiction but also has elements of space opera.
[edit] Hard SF
Main article: Hard science fiction
Arthur C. Clarke
Hard science fiction, or "hard SF", is characterized by rigorous attention to accurate detail in quantitative sciences, especially physics, astrophysics, and chemistry, or on accurately depicting worlds that more advanced technology may make possible. Many accurate predictions of the future come from the hard science fiction subgenre, but numerous inaccurate predictions have emerged as well.[citation needed] Some hard SF authors have distinguished themselves as working scientists, including Gregory Benford, Geoffrey A. Landis and David Brin,[46][47] while mathematician authors include Rudy Rucker and Vernor Vinge. Other noteworthy hard SF authors include Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Hal Clement, Greg Bear, Larry Niven, Robert J. Sawyer, Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Charles Sheffield, Ben Bova, Kim Stanley Robinson and Greg Egan.
[edit] Soft and social SF
Main article: Soft science fiction
The description "soft" science fiction may describe works based on social sciences such as psychology, economics, political science, sociology, and anthropology. Noteworthy writers in this category include Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick.[28][48] The term can describe stories focused primarily on character and emotion; SFWA Grand Master Ray Bradbury was an acknowledged master of this art.[49] The Eastern Bloc produced a large quantity of social science fiction, including works by Polish authors Stanislaw Lem and Janusz Zajdel, as well as Soviet authors such as the Strugatsky brothers, Kir Bulychov, Yevgeny Zamyatin and Ivan Yefremov.[50][51] Some writers blur the boundary between hard and soft science fiction.[52]
Related to social SF and soft SF are utopian and dystopian stories; George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale are examples. Satirical novels with fantastic settings such as Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift may also be considered science fiction or speculative fiction.
[edit] Cyberpunk
Main article: Cyberpunk
The cyberpunk genre emerged in the early 1980s; combining cybernetics and punk,[53] the term was coined by author Bruce Bethke for his 1980 short story "Cyberpunk".[54] The time frame is usually near-future and the settings are often dystopian in nature and characterized by misery. Common themes in cyberpunk include advances in information technology and especially the Internet, visually abstracted as cyberspace, artificial intelligence and prosthetics and post-democratic societal control where corporations have more influence than governments. Nihilism, post-modernism, and film noir techniques are common elements, and the protagonists may be disaffected or reluctant anti-heroes. Noteworthy authors in this genre are William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, and Pat Cadigan. James O'Ehley has called the 1982 film Blade Runner a definitive example of the cyberpunk visual style.[55]
[edit] Time travel
Time travel stories have antecedents in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first major time travel novel was Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. The most famous is H. G. Wells's 1895 novel The Time Machine, which uses a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposefully and selectively, while Twain's time traveler is struck in the head. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now universally used to refer to such a vehicle. Stories of this type are complicated by logical problems such as the grandfather paradox.[56] Time travel continues to be a popular subject in modern science fiction, in print, movies, and television such as the BBC television series Doctor Who.
[edit] Alternate history
Main article: Alternate history
Alternate (or alternative) history stories are based on the premise that historical events might have turned out differently. These stories may use time travel to change the past, or may simply set a story in a universe with a different history from our own. Classics in the genre include Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore, in which the South wins the American Civil War, and The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick, in which Germany and Japan win World War II. The Sidewise Award acknowledges the best works in this subgenre; the name is taken from Murray Leinster's 1934 story "Sidewise in Time." Harry Turtledove is one of the most prominent authors in the subgenre and is sometimes called the "master of alternate history".[57][58]
[edit] Military SF
Main article: Military science fiction
Military science fiction is set in the context of conflict between national, interplanetary, or interstellar armed forces; the primary viewpoint characters are usually soldiers. Stories include detail about military technology, procedure, ritual, and history; military stories may use parallels with historical conflicts. Heinlein's Starship Troopers is an early example, along with the Dorsai novels of Gordon Dickson. Joe Haldeman's The Forever War is a critique of the genre, a Vietnam-era response to the World War II–style stories of earlier authors.[59] Prominent military SF authors include John Ringo, David Drake, David Weber, and S. M. Stirling. The publishing company Baen Books is known for cultivating military science fiction authors.[60]
[edit] Superhuman
Superhuman stories deal with the emergence of humans who have abilities beyond the norm. This can stem either from natural causes such as in Olaf Stapledon's novel Odd John, and Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human, or be the result of intentional augmentation such as in A. E. van Vogt's novel Slan. These stories usually focus on the alienation that these beings feel as well as society's reaction to them. These stories have played a role in the real life discussion of human enhancement. Frederik Pohl's Man Plus also belongs to this category.
[edit] Apocalyptic
Main article: Apocalyptic fiction
Apocalyptic fiction is concerned with the end of civilization through war (On the Beach), pandemic (The Last Man), astronomic impact (When Worlds Collide), ecological disaster (The Wind from Nowhere), or some other general disaster or with a world or civilization after such a disaster. Typical of the genre are George R. Stewart's novel Earth Abides and Pat Frank's novel Alas, Babylon. Apocalyptic fiction generally concerns the disaster itself and the direct aftermath, while post-apocalyptic can deal with anything from the near aftermath (as in Cormac McCarthy's The Road) to 375 years in the future (as in By The Waters of Babylon) to hundreds or thousands of years in the future, as in Russell Hoban's novel Riddley Walker and Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz.
[edit] Space opera
Main article: Space opera
Space opera is adventure science fiction set in outer space or on distant planets. The conflict is heroic, and typically on a large scale.
Space opera is sometimes used pejoratively, to describe improbable plots, absurd science, and cardboard characters. But it is also used nostalgically, and modern space opera may be an attempt to recapture the sense of wonder of the golden age of science fiction. The pioneer of this subgenre is generally recognized to be Edward E. (Doc) Smith, with his Skylark and Lensman series. The Star Trek television series franchise is often described as space opera that encourages this sense of wonder, in that most of the scripts are generally about peaceful space exploration and examinations of cultural differences rather than about conflict between civilizations. Alastair Reynolds's Revelation Space series, Peter F. Hamilton's Void, Night's Dawn and Pandora's Star series, and Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky are newer examples of this genre.
[edit] Space Western
Main article: Space western
Space Western could be considered a sub-genre of space opera that transposes themes of the American Western books and film to a backdrop of futuristic space frontiers. These stories typically involve "frontier" colony worlds (colonies that have only recently been terraformed and/or settled) serving as stand-ins for the backdrop of lawlessness and economic expansion that were predominant in the American west. Examples include the Sean Connery film Outland, the Firefly television series, and the film sequel Serenity by Joss Whedon, as well as the manga and anime series Trigun, Outlaw Star, and Cowboy Bebop.
[edit] Other sub-genres
This section requires expansion. (June 2008)
Anthropological science fiction is a sub-genre that absorbs and discusses anthropology and the study of human kind. Examples include Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer, and Neanderthal by John Darnton.
Biopunk focuses on biotechnology and subversives.
Comic science fiction is a sub-genre that exploits the genre's conventions for comic effect.
Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender and the unequal political and personal power of men and women. Some of the most notable feminist science fiction works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.[61] Joanna Russ's work, and some of Ursula Le Guin's work can be thus categorised.
Science fiction poetry is an overlooked and under-discussed sub-category of science fiction. As Seo-Young Chu remarks in her 2011 book Do Metaphors Dream of Literal Sleep? A Science-Fictional Theory of Representation, science fiction is not often (enough) thought of as a genre related to lyric poetry. But as Chu points out, there are plenty of examples of science fiction poetry and verse by writers including Diane Ackerman, Emily Dickinson, Suzette Haden Elgin (who founded the Science Fiction Poetry Association and authored The Science Fiction Poetry Handbook), Ruth Fainlight, Robert Frazier, Cathy Park Hong, Andrew Joron, and Frederick Turner, among many others. Chu also points out that lyricism is an overlooked yet overwhelming presence in science fiction novels, stories, and films.[62]
Steampunk is based on the idea of futuristic technology existing in the past, usually the 19th century, and often set in Victorian era England—but with prominent elements of either science fiction or fantasy, such as fictional technological inventions like those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, or real technological developments like the computer occurring at an earlier date. Popular examples include The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, as well as the Girl Genius series by Phil and Kaja Foglio, although seeds of the genre may be seen in certain works of Michael Moorcock, Philip Jose Farmer and Steve Stiles, and in such games as Space 1889 and Marcus Rowland's Forgotten Futures. Machines are most often powered by steam in this genre (hence the name).
Dieselpunk takes over where Steampunk leaves off. These are stories that take over as we usher in the machine-heavy eras of WWI and WWII. The use of diesel-powered machines plays heavily. In this (like its steam counterpart), the focus is on the technology.
[edit] Related genres
[edit] Speculative fiction, fantasy, and horror
For more details on this topic, see speculative fiction.
The broader category of speculative fiction[63] includes science fiction, fantasy, alternate histories (which may have no particular scientific or futuristic component), and even literary stories that contain fantastic elements, such as the work of Jorge Luis Borges or John Barth. For some editors, magic realism is considered to be within the broad definition of speculative fiction.[64]
[edit] Fantasy
Main article: Fantasy
Fantasy is closely associated with science fiction, and many writers have worked in both genres, while writers such as Anne McCaffrey, Ursula K. LeGuin, and Marion Zimmer Bradley have written works that appear to blur the boundary between the two related genres.[65] The authors' professional organization is called the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA).[66] SF conventions routinely have programming on fantasy topics,[67][68][69] and fantasy authors such as J. K. Rowling have won the highest honor within the science fiction field, the Hugo Award.[70]
In general, science fiction differs from fantasy in that the former concerns things that might someday be possible or that at least embody the pretense of realism. Supernaturalism, usually absent in science fiction, is the distinctive characteristic of fantasy literature. A dictionary definition referring to fantasy literature is "fiction characterized by highly fanciful or supernatural elements." [71] Examples of fantasy supernaturalism include magic (spells, harm to opponents), magical places (Narnia, Oz, Middle Earth, Hogwarts), supernatural creatures (witches, vampires, orcs, trolls), supernatural transportation (flying broomsticks, ruby slippers, windows between worlds), and shapeshifting (beast into man, man into wolf or bear, lion into sheep). Such things are basic themes in fantasy.[72] Literary critic Fredric Jameson has characterized the difference between the two genres by describing science fiction as turning "on a formal framework determined by concepts of the mode of production rather than those of religion" - that is, science fiction texts are bound by an inner logic based more on historical materialism than on magic or the forces of good and evil.[73] Some narratives are described as being essentially science fiction but "with fantasy elements". The term "science fantasy" is sometimes used to describe such material.[74]
[edit] Horror fiction
Main article: Horror fiction
Horror fiction is the literature of the unnatural and supernatural, with the aim of unsettling or frightening the reader, sometimes with graphic violence. Historically it has also been known as weird fiction. Although horror is not per se a branch of science fiction, many works of horror literature incorporates science fictional elements. One of the defining classical works of horror, Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, is the first fully realized work of science fiction, where the manufacture of the monster is given a rigorous science-fictional grounding. The works of Edgar Allan Poe also helped define both the science fiction and the horror genres.[75] Today horror is one of the most popular categories of films.[76] Horror is often mistakenly categorized as science fiction at the point of distribution by libraries, video rental outlets, etc. For example, Syfy (distributed via cable and satellite television in the United States) currently devotes most its air time to horror films with very few science fiction titles.[citation needed]
[edit] Mystery fiction
Main article: Mystery fiction
Works in which science and technology are a dominant theme, but based on current reality, may be considered mainstream fiction. Much of the thriller genre would be included, such as the novels of Tom Clancy or Michael Crichton, or the James Bond films.[77] Modernist works from writers like Kurt Vonnegut, Philip K. Dick, and Stanisław Lem have focused on speculative or existential perspectives on contemporary reality and are on the borderline between SF and the mainstream.[78] According to Robert J. Sawyer, "Science fiction and mystery have a great deal in common. Both prize the intellectual process of puzzle solving, and both require stories to be plausible and hinge on the way things really do work."[79] Isaac Asimov, Walter Mosley, and other writers incorporate mystery elements in their science fiction, and vice versa.
[edit] Superhero fiction
Main article: Superhero fiction
Superhero fiction is a genre characterized by beings with much higher than usual capability and prowess, generally with a desire or need to help the citizens of their chosen country or world by using his or her powers to defeat natural or superpowered threats. Many superhero fiction characters involve themselves (either intentionally or accidentally) with science fiction and fact, including advanced technologies, alien worlds, time travel, and interdimensional travel; but the standards of scientific plausibility are lower than with actual science fiction. Authors of this genre include Stan Lee (co-creator of Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and the Hulk); Marv Wolfman, the creator of Blade for Marvel Comics, and The New Teen Titans for DC Comics; Dean Wesley Smith (Smallville, Spider-Man, and X-Men novels) and Superman writers Roger Stern and Elliot S! Maggin.
[edit] Fandom and community
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction fandom.
Science fiction fandom is the "community of the literature of ideas... the culture in which new ideas emerge and grow before being released into society at large".[80] Members of this community, "fans", are in contact with each other at conventions or clubs, through print or online fanzines, or on the Internet using web sites, mailing lists, and other resources.
SF fandom emerged from the letters column in Amazing Stories magazine. Soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines.[81] Once they were in regular contact, fans wanted to meet each other, and they organized local clubs. In the 1930s, the first science fiction conventions gathered fans from a wider area.[82] Conventions, clubs, and fanzines were the dominant form of fan activity, or "fanac", for decades, until the Internet facilitated communication among a much larger population of interested people.
[edit] Awards
For more details on this topic, see List of science fiction awards.
Among the most respected awards for science fiction are the Hugo Award, presented by the World Science Fiction Society at Worldcon; the Nebula Award, presented by SFWA and voted on by the community of authors; and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for short fiction. One notable award for science fiction films is the Saturn Award. It is presented annually by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films.
There are national awards, like Canada's Aurora Award, regional awards, like the Endeavour Award presented at Orycon for works from the Pacific Northwest, special interest or subgenre awards like the Chesley Award for art or the World Fantasy Award for fantasy. Magazines may organize reader polls, notably the Locus Award.
[edit] Conventions, clubs, and organizations
For more details on this topic, see Science fiction conventions.
Pamela Dean reading at Minicon
Conventions (in fandom, shortened as "cons"), are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership. General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, etc. Most are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters. The convention's activities are called the "program", which may include panel discussions, readings, autograph sessions, costume masquerades, and other events. Activities that occur throughout the convention are not part of the program; these commonly include a dealer's room, art show, and hospitality lounge (or "con suites").[83]
Conventions may host award ceremonies; Worldcons present the Hugo Awards each year. SF societies, referred to as "clubs" except in formal contexts, form a year-round base of activities for science fiction fans. They may be associated with an ongoing science fiction convention, or have regular club meetings, or both. Most groups meet in libraries, schools and universities, community centers, pubs or restaurants, or the homes of individual members. Long-established groups like the New England Science Fiction Association and the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society have clubhouses for meetings and storage of convention supplies and research materials.[84] The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) was founded by Damon Knight in 1965 as a non-profit organization to serve the community of professional science fiction authors,[66] 24 years after his essay "Unite or Fie!" had led to the organization of the National Fantasy Fan Federation. Fandom has helped incubate related groups, including media fandom,[85] the Society for Creative Anachronism,[86] gaming,[87] filking, and furry fandom.
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