The Biology of Science Fiction Film

Catalog description

This course will combine the disciplines of Biology and Film Studies to explore both the facts and the fantasies of science-fiction films. By looking at a diverse selection of films that represent multiple aspects of the biological sciences, students will get a sense of how much actual scientific ideas are worked through in fictional texts, and how they might gain access to the sciences through these fictions. The Film studies side of the course will ask students to consider what kind of cultural fantasies and/or anxieties are being represented in these films, and how fiction guides our thinking as much as scientific facts. The ultimate goal of the course is to allow students to see the relations between the humanities and the sciences, and to think through the relation of nature to culture.