Your Friend Academia

[cathschaffstump]

Last year at Wiscon, I attended a panel regarding speculative fiction, and the panel unfortunately devolved into a panel where the majority of the panelists, perhaps frustrated with experiences they had had, ran down the academy.

Well, as a member of the academy, I did take some exception. That same year I had attended the fairly good Fantasy Matters conference. I had visited some genre libraries. I had been tempted by three other well known conferences. I was presenting an academic paper at Wiscon. My own college supported my pop culture research and writing. I had just found out about the Interstitial Foundation. It seemed that the academy was alive and well, and supporting our literatures of the fantastic!

So, I thought maybe this year we could a panel to make me feel better. Oh--and to educate the public. I hope we can tap the expertise of a variety of you who enjoy the study of this sort of thing, or have attended conferences, or contributed to a variety of journals and ezines, or have been in organized writing workshops for SF, Fantasy, and speculative fiction.

I've posted the following as a program suggestion for Wiscon this year. If they accept it, and if the topic interests you, I hope you'll consider joining me on a panel. Spread the word among your friends whom you think might be interested.

Sometimes authors feel that the academy is against genre fiction. On this panel, we'll discuss the various ways academia supports and fosters the writing and critiquing of science fiction, fantasy, speculative fiction, and other literatures of the fantastic through workshops, classes, study centers, critiques, scholarly publications, folklore study programs, and conferences (including Wiscon's academic track!) If you're interested in learning about, or sharing resources you know, this panel is for you!
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Originally published at Writer Tamago. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[krysta-3.livejournal.com]

aack! I'm so sorry to keep leaving comments on your old blog post. I just realized there's been a gliche when I click on your avatar in my friend's list, it always takes me to the same post, so all this time I thought you hadn't been posting anything new. SO I would leave little messages for you there. Eeps. That's so random. Thanks for your patience.

Anyway, just wanted to assure you that I wasn't ignoring your new posts. This one is very interesting, and I'd love to input, but I don't feel adept enough in the subjects yet to be on a panel. Still, I would LOVE to attend the workshops / conferences. Unfortunately Wisconson is a galaxy far far away from me.

[cathschaffstump.livejournal.com]

No worries. I just thought you were being friendly, and just busy. :)

Catherine