Speculative Futures: Researching Science, Fiction and Technology

Step into the future on Wednesday, April 22, from 1:00–4:00 PM in McKeldin 4109 for Speculative Futures: Researching Science, Fiction, and Technology. Join faculty from across disciplines as they critically engage with the science fiction genre and its impacts on popular culture and society. This afternoon of Scholarship and Conversation will feature three faculty talks and light refreshments. Whether you’re a lifelong sci-fi enthusiast or just curious about the future, this is your chance to explore the boundary between imagination and innovation.

Featured Speakers:

Nicole Yunger Halpern and Edward Daschle: “Quantum Steampunk: A Conversation Across Disciplines” 

• Steampunk is a science-fiction genre in which futuristic technologies populate Victorian-era settings. Recently, steampunk has come to life in the scientific field of quantum thermodynamics. Thermodynamics, the study of energy, grew out of the Industrial Revolution. Two centuries later, quantum physics is transforming computing and cryptography. Quantum science is now revolutionizing 19th-century thermodynamics in quantum thermodynamics, which features quantum engines, automata, and more. Quantum thermodynamics inspired the growing subgenre of quantum steampunk. A writing instructor and a physicist are co-teaching quantum-steampunk creative writing to students from across the academic spectrum at UMD. The two will share their perspectives on the course, the emerging genre, and interdisciplinarity in this session.

Leigha McReynolds: “Future Bodies: Imagining a World with Disability” 

• In her essay “The Future is (Not) Disabled,” disabled science fiction author Marieke Nijkamp challenges able-bodied authors to create an inclusive future. In this interactive workshop, we’ll consider our own relationship to ability and disability and use Nijkamp’s call as inspiration for considering how all of us, as people working to build a future, can proactively create space — literally and metaphorically — for diverse minds and bodies.

Mitchell Adam Pavao-Zuckerman: “Can science fiction help solve climate change?”

• Science fiction influences the way we imagine and shape the future. Climate change makes this even more pressing by challenging us to imagine a safe, humane, and equitable future before we can move towards building it. This discussion will explore how speculative narratives influence real-world thinking about resilience, technology, and social systems by drawing on Dr. Mitchell’s Pavao-Zuckerman’s Honors College course on science, fiction, and the environment. We will engage in a few short interactive exercises to envision and reimagine possible futures and consider how science fiction storytelling can inform action today.