Doctor of Philosophy / In this thesis I discuss feminist science fiction as a literature that explores a variety of alternative social realities. This provides the site to explore alternative notions of the heroic inspired by feminist critiques of the traditional heroic, which come from feminist philosophical, as well as literary critical sources. Alternative notions of the heroic offer a shift in perspective from a specific heroic identity to the events the characters are involved in. The shift to events is made precisely because that is where the temporal is located and dynamic change occurs. Events are where 'becoming' alternatively heroic occurs: in the interaction between a character and the environment.

Ursula K. Le Guin is often called a feminist science fiction author. Drawing on such theorists as bell hooks and R. W. Connell, I analyze three novels by Le Guin from a social constructivist feminist perspective. I discuss The Dispossessed as it relates to gender and the family in utopian writing, The Lathe of Heaven with respect to gender and race, and Lavinia and gender within the context of the overall trajectory of Le Guin’s writing. I conclude that these novels depict gender in ways that often essentialize identity, whether the novels’ presentations of gender align with liberal or radical feminist ideas, and sometimes represent characters more conservatively than the label “feminist author” might imply. I propose that Le Guin’s status as a feminist writer requires more specific qualification that accounts for the variety of beliefs in existence in contemporary feminist discourse.

Doctor of Philosophy / In this thesis I discuss feminist science fiction as a literature that explores a variety of alternative social realities. This provides the site to explore alternative notions of the heroic inspired by feminist critiques of the traditional heroic, which come from feminist philosophical, as well as literary critical sources. Alternative notions of the heroic offer a shift in perspective from a specific heroic identity to the events the characters are involved in. The shift to events is made precisely because that is where the temporal is located and dynamic change occurs. Events are where 'becoming' alternatively heroic occurs: in the interaction between a character and the environment.

This project documents my efforts to publish STS- and gender theory-informed articles in engineering education journals. It analyzes the processes of writing and revising three articles submitted to three different journals, aiming to shed light on the field of engineering education, gender research therein, and contribute to feminist science studies literature on the challenges and opportunities of interdisciplinary work across women's studies and STEM fields. Building upon Wenger's concept of brokering, I analyze how I brought previously underexplored STS and feminist theory literature into engineering education journals. In producing this dissertation, I aim to illuminate some of the efforts and challenges of bringing STS and Women's Studies (WS) topics into engineering education journals – thus producing an account of brokering practices and an example of scalable scholarship. The first chapter introduces engineering education research (EER) as a field of inquiry, situates my project with respect to current feminist science studies, summarizes the framework of brokering that informs my analyses, and describes my methodology. The second chapter describes my initial attempts at brokering by identifying and bridging differences and the preliminary brokering practices that emerged through writing and revising the first of my three articles. It discusses an article published in Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes the uses of feminist theory in EER and argues that further engagement with a broader range of feminist theories could benefit EER. The third chapter describes how some of these practices were reinforced, but also supplemented, while writing and revising the second article. It discusses an article published in International Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes problematizations of underrepresentation in EER and argues that further reflection upon and formal discussion of how underrepresentation is framed could benefit EER. The forth chapter describes how the established brokering practices guided writing the third article, making the process easier as I had become more comfortable with the requirements and challenges of brokering. It discusses an article submitted to European Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes feminist research methodologies in the context of EER, using data from interviews with feminist engineering educators. The fifth chapter concludes by summarizing the brokering practices and discussing their respective challenges, discussing the implications of this project for STS and WS, and, finally, by discussing other implications for peer review engineering education. The Appendix contains aims, scope, author guidelines, and review criteria for the three journals. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 each begin with a narrative recounting of the practices of brokering that went into producing and revising each article. The narratives describe processes of writing and preparing to submit the articles, reviews received, and subsequent revision processes. The published or submitted articles appear after the brokering narrative. / Ph. D.

Chapter one, “Narrating Entanglement: Posthuman Agency and Subjectivity in Shane Carruth’s Filmography,” considers the resonances of independent filmmaker Shane Carruth’s two SF films, Primer (2004) and Upstream Color (2013) with the ethos of quantum entanglement through close-readings of Primer’s anti-individualistic portrayal of scientific invention and Upstream Color’s metaphorically entangled human-pig character system. Chapter two, “Race and Schrödingers’s Legacy: History is Both Alive and Dead in Hari Kunzru’s White Tears” analyzes the 2017 novel White Tears as a narrative figuration of of the political, racial, and cultural entanglements set in motion by the economic structure of slavery, ultimately arguing that Kunzru’s entangled plotlines and histories critique the entanglement of contemporary U.S. capitalism with its past and present exploitation of black bodies. The third and final chapter, “Problem Child: Untangling the Reproduction Narrative in Lai and Phang’s SF Bildungsromans” uses close readings of two SF bildungsromans, Larissa Lai’s 2002 novel Salt Fish Girl and Jennifer Phang’s 2015 film Advantageous, both of which follow women of color protagonists not permitted to grow up in the ‘right’ ways, to shed light on the instability of a social order simultaneously grounded in the exploitation of marginalized bodies and the illusion of a reproducible, homogenous nation. Ultimately, “Entangled Bodies” uses a literary exploration of quantum entanglement to reveal both the limits of seemingly-totalizing power structures, narrative or otherwise, and the collective possibilities for re-definition that can, in part, be kindled by a favored tool of Western science: the human imagination.

Works of feminist utopian literature project longing for and predict political change while confronting current social inequities. Often, they effectively interrogate Western models of citizenship and the institutions which reify them, suggesting alternate models. Here, I define Western citizenship as determined by the maintenance of the nation-state through gendered social roles that restrict women to the private sphere and men to the public. This thesis asserts that feminist utopian literature, like politically conscious music, art, and other forms of feminist praxis, is a politically necessary component of feminist consciousness because it facilitates much-needed visions of a more equitable future for all citizens. Here, patriarchy, separatism, socialism, and radical democracy, as well as attendant difficulties in implementation and ramifications for women, will be considered through the following works: Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Herland, Sally Miller Gearhart’s The Wanderground, Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Dispossessed, Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, and Starhawk’s The Fifth Sacred Thing. The thesis also comments on some of the narrative devices and themes of works discussed, such as nonlinear structure, avoidance of closure, altered states of consciousness, and exile. Analysis of these works relies in part on a growing body of speculative fiction criticism while also considering feminist theories of difference and vision. The thesis concludes with recommendations for utilizing feminist utopian literature as a part of feminist pedagogy.

This dissertation explores the ways that women authors of science fiction have altered conventions of utopia and science fiction in order to revise conceptions of gender, sexuality, the body, and the environment. I examine several twentieth-century feminist critical dystopias that continue to betray genre and form, and to shape the science fiction being written at this moment. Each of the works demonstrates particular elements that facilitate its revisionary power: challenging and deconstructing sex/gender systems, blending utopian and dystopian conventions, and engaging in temporal play. By doing so they accomplish a range of tasks: disrupting generic and historical conventions, blending genres, redefining utopia, and making connections with present realities in order to make a case for social change, particularly for female and queer subjects. Though many of the texts are considered canonical by sf standards, and have been widely praised and critiqued in academic publications, each one continues its project of resistance in the light of the genre and of ever-evolving theories of gender, sexuality, race, and identity. As a scholar of gender and queer theory, I find within sf an extraordinary realm of potential for those willing to challenge norms and imagine new possibilities. In their rejection of system and form, the authors render impure the genre of science fiction, providing a new space in which utopian ideals can become literary and cultural resistance.

This thesis proposes the relevance of epigenetic research to feminist studies and gender studies, and vice versa, and asks how epigenetics speaks to the so-called sex-gender distinction. It also discusses what epigenetics could potentially tell us about ourselves, and our place in a world where we are all creatures of both nature and nurture. The author proposes that with its promise of insight into the relationship of the body to environment and experience over time, epigenetics could be an inextricable link between nature and nurture. Combining a modified version of diffractive analysis, and gender/sex as an analytical device, the author engages with epigenetic research and its representation in popular science and in the public imaginary. After discussing the striations of feminist discourse on permeable bodies, the author proposes epigenetics as another layer in the strata, placing epigenetics within feminist and gender studies literature and discourse. Noting that as research gains ground the way in which the public imagines and describes epigenetics gives shape to its materialization and development, this thesis asserts the urgent need for social sciences, and in particular feminist and gender studies, to engage in critical discourse

This thesis proposes the relevance of epigenetic research to feminist studies and gender studies, and vice versa, and asks how epigenetics speaks to the so-called sex-gender distinction. It also discusses what epigenetics could potentially tell us about ourselves, and our place in a world where we are all creatures of both nature and nurture. The author proposes that with its promise of insight into the relationship of the body to environment and experience over time, epigenetics could be an inextricable link between nature and nurture. Combining a modified version of diffractive analysis, and gender/sex as an analytical device, the author engages with epigenetic research and its representation in popular science and in the public imaginary. After discussing the striations of feminist discourse on permeable bodies, the author proposes epigenetics as another layer in the strata, placing epigenetics within feminist and gender studies literature and discourse. Noting that as research gains ground the way in which the public imagines and describes epigenetics gives shape to its materialization and development, this thesis asserts the urgent need for social sciences, and in particular feminist and gender studies, to engage in critical discourse with epigenetic research as it is carried out and as it is translated to the wider public.

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