When: October 2 – November 1, 2020
Where: Online — Available everywhere and at your own pace
Price: $500

Worldbuilding for speculative fiction or SSFnal games can be a daunting task; even moreso for writers who want to create or explore inclusive cultures filled with diverse characters but without unconsciously replicating colonialist structures and viewpoints. This class offers writers a deep dive into key aspects of building inclusive worlds — Creating Cultures, Ideology, Religion, Cosmology, Sociobiology, Research, and more — with a plethora of outstanding builders of speculative worlds: Steven Barnes, P. Djèlí Clark, Jaymee Goh, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Nilah Magruder, Pam Punzalan, Rebecca Roanhorse, and Nisi Shawl.

This four-week class includes video lectures and interviews plus extensive discussion and Q&A on each topic. Students will leave the class with a deep worldbuilding toolset and resources for further study.

• Required Text
• Course Format, Schedule, and Time Commitment
• Worldbuilding Lectures & Interviews
• Accessibility
• Who Should Take This Class?
• Full and Partial Scholarship Opportunities
• Instructors and Contributing Lecturers
• Refund Policy
• Register

Required Text

Before class, please purchase and read:

• Writing the Other: A Practical Approach by Cynthia Ward and Nisi Shawl

Course Format, Schedule, and Time Commitment

The class does not have set meeting times. You can access lectures, other class materials, and group discussions at any time from anywhere in the world as long as you have an Internet connection. All Q&As and class discussions will take place in a private online forum.

Students will have exclusive access to video lectures and interviews (closed-captioned with transcripts available) diving deep into issues around worldbuilding and inclusion. In weeks 2, 3, and 4 students will have the opportunity to ask our participating instructors questions based on the lectures and interviews or students’ own works in process. See the schedule below for details. NOTE: Some of the lecturers will not be available for Q&A this session. In addition to the lectures, there will be discussion posts, writing exercises, and analysis of published fiction.

The last week of class includes a final chance to ask all participating instructors questions.

Full Schedule

Oct 2: Video: The Bones of the World: Ideology, Genre, and the Foundations of Story lecture by Max Gladstone
Oct 3: Video: How To Write Science Fiction And Fantasy Cultures Without Using Analogs lecture by Kate Elliott
Video: Sociobiology and Worldbuilding interview with Steven Barnes
Oct 4: Video: Creating Religions and Cosmologies interview with Nisi Shawl and Andrea Hairston
Oct 10: Q&A and in-depth discussion with Steven Barnes, P. Djèlí Clark, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Rebecca Roanhorse, and Nisi Shawl
Oct 16: Videos: Writing Positive Portrayals of Asexual Characters and Building a World Without Love Hierarchies lectures by Lauren Jankowski
Video: Historical Research Sans Colonialist Frameworks lecture by Jaymee Goh
Oct 17 – 23: Q&A and in-depth discussion with Jaymee Goh and Nilah Magruder
Cultural Appropriation Q&A with K. Tempest Bradford
Oct 24: Q&A on Inclusive Worldbuilding and Game Creation with Pam Punzalan
Oct 31 – Nov 1: Final Q&A with Steven Barnes, P. Djèlí Clark, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Nilah Magruder, Pam Punzalan, Rebecca Roanhorse, Nisi Shawl plus Max Gladstone, Kate Elliott, and Lauren Jankowski.

The time commitment each week will depend on your level of participation. Lectures run from 45 minutes to 1.5 hours. Discussion threads tend to be wide-ranging, so students should try to check in at least once a day or every other day and set aside up to an hour for participation. Readings will be short.

Worldbuilding Lectures & Interviews:

The Bones of the World: Ideology, Genre, and the Foundations of Story with Max Gladstone

Storytellers tell stories in traditions. We write about psychics or magic swords or unicorns because we grew up reading about them. But when we write our own stories, we must not unthinkingly follow in the footsteps of tradition. To gain mastery, we must know what those stories and their forms meant when they were first deployed, and what purpose they serve. Sometimes a storytelling tradition may perpetuate ideologies to which we don’t subscribe—or operate in a deeply damaging way. Also, if we do not understand the ideologies underpinning a story world, we may not understand just why it spoke to us so persuasively. This lecture will analyze the underlying ideological structures of worldbuilding—and encourage students to engage with those foundations in their own writing, producing new, vital perspectives on genre.

Note: Max Gladstone will ONLY be available for the final Q&A this session.

How To Write Science Fiction and Fantasy Cultures Without Using Analogs with Kate Elliott

Analog cultures — human cultures whose history and culture is a thinly disguised version of an historical Earth culture or non-human races in speculative fiction who have a small set of distinguishing cultural characteristics that seem analogous to a known human culture — litter the fantasy and science fiction landscape. When authors do this well it can provide powerful analogies and metaphors in their work. When they do it badly, allowing unconscious or conscious biases to lead to cultures mired in offensive stereotypes, it harms both readers and authors alike. This lecture analyzes how analog cultures have been used in SFF, and offers strategies for how to create cultures that aren’t badly or offensively done.

Note: Kate Elliott will ONLY be available for the final Q&A this session.

Sociobiology and Worldbuilding: an Interview with Steven Barnes

Culture, psychology, economics, mating rituals, rules, and laws all relate to survival and reproductive imperatives within a constructed world. While a culture is more than “mere” reproduction and survival, a huge amount of what we are today can be traced back to this single aspect. When the environment or technologies change, the social inertia can take generations to catch up. Change a single factor, and it will ripple through the rest of the culture, influencing religion, language, mythology, and more. Sexism, racism, tribalism, homophobia…all these and more can be traced back to this single aspect, and understanding how this must impact your worldbuilding requires that you understand how our ancestors “got here” in the first place. In this interview, Steven Barnes talks to K. Tempest Bradford about how having your own theory of how cultures develop in response to this pressure gives writers a killer foundation for their worldbuilding.

Creating Religions and Cosmologies with Nisi Shawl and Andrea Hairston

Cosmology is a model of the universe: how it’s made, what it’s made of, how it works. Religion and spiritual practices are how people live their lives in light of their cosmology. Even if you think your world doesn’t need religion, the cultures in it still need a cosmology. Whether you’re creating cosmologies, religions, or spiritualities from whole cloth or basing them on existing cultures, it’s important to understand why and how they develop and to avoid colonialist and stereotypical foundations in your conceptions. In this interview, Nisi and Andrea discuss non-dominant religions and cosmologies, exploring their roots and fruits and riffing on how their representation looks.

Note: Andrea Hairston will not be available for Q&A this session.

Historical Research Sans Colonialist Frameworks with Jaymee Goh, PhD

This lecture will offer tips and tricks on the practicalities and pitfalls of doing historical research. We will go over the definitions of concepts like colonialism, Orientalism, and whiteness, grounded in academic research. We will also discuss types of texts, and the best approaches to dealing with them. The aim of this lecture is to provide a clear definition of the unconscious biases and problems that come up, both in the researcher and in the research.

Building a World Without Love Hierarchies with Lauren Jankowski

There has been a push to get more asexual and aromantic representation in literature, particularly in the speculative genres. However, with this push, we’re still seeing the same tired romantic tropes playing out. Authors are frequently plugging ace and aro characters into romances, thus creating characters who are ace and aro in name only.

In order to accurately represent asexuals and aromantic people, authors need to tackle the issue that has dogged both communities: love hierarchies. How does one do that when we live in a world with an incredibly narrow view of what love is and what sort of love is important? This lecture will help writers understand how to build a world that isn’t reliant on love hierarchies. It will touch on ways characters can platonically show love to each other and challenge students to face their own preconceived notions of love in the worlds they create.

Note: Lauren Jankowski will ONLY be available for the final Q&A this session. Questions on this topic will be answered by Nilah Magruder during Week 3.

In addition to the lectures, the class also includes:

Inclusive Worldbuilding and Game Creation Q&A with Pam Punzalan

How we play and what we play already says so much about us. What we build on the pretense of playing alone or with other people says even more. The game worlds we build are direct reflections of who we are and the contexts we are in. Beyond that, there are critical points of difference between games writing and other narratives that don’t often get discussed. In this Q&A, queer indie game designer Pam Punzalan will offer wisdom on what students learn in lectures to game creation, gameplay, and game systems.

Cultural Appropriation Q&A with K. Tempest Bradford

Most writers want to avoid Cultural Appropriation but worry that they don’t fully understand what it is or how to ensure their work doesn’t include it. Students will have access to resources that explain what cultural appropriation is and is not, the difference between appropriation and exchange or influence, and strategies for depicting cultures sensitively plus an opportunity to ask detailed questions about the readings.

Accessibility

The lecture videos are closed captioned and transcribed; the text will be available to all students. The private forum uses WordPress with a theme specifically geared to accessibility and compatibility with screen readers. We strive to make all classes as accessible as possible, but if you need any extra considerations or have a question about accessibility, please contact us.

Who Should Take This Class?

This course is specifically designed to benefit writers of speculative fiction — Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and all sub-genres, interstitial genres, and weird fiction — whether you write for Adult, YA, or Middle Grade audiences. This class will benefit writers across multiple mediums — Prose, Playwriting, Screenwriting, Comics/Graphic Novels, Games — at any point in their career from newbie to professional. 

Full and Partial Scholarship Opportunities

Thanks to the generosity of donors and the continued support of our Patreon backers we are offering 10 20 full and partial Vonda N. McIntyre Sentient Squid Scholarships for this class. (If you’d like to contribute, you can make a donation on the right.)

If you do not have the financial means to pay for all or part of the registration cost for this class, we encourage you to apply.  We have a broad definition of financial need that ranges from writers who do not have the money at all to writers who have the funds but can’t afford to use them for a writing class. We especially encourage writers who have been financially impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic to apply. Wherever you exist on the financial needs spectrum, don’t self reject! (Still not sure whether you should apply? Read this post.)

If you can afford to pay for part but not all of the registration fee, please apply for a partial scholarship. Under this financial aid plan you can let us know the amount you can afford. If you cannot afford to pay at all, please apply for a full scholarship. 

To apply, please fill out this form by 11:59PM Pacific September 20, 2020. You’ll be asked to provide:

• A brief (300 or fewer words) statement of financial need. If you’re applying based on COVID-19 financial hardship, we will not ask you to provide proof of impact.
• A brief (500 or fewer words) description of a work or works in progress that you hope the class will help you create.
• If you identify as Black, Indigenous, Native American, First Nations, or any other Persons of Color, or you may indicate that if you wish, though it’s not a requirement. (We set aside some scholarship spots specifically for students who identify as BIPOC, though we do not limit the number of scholarships we’ll give to BIPOC applicants.)

Deadline: 11:59PM Pacific September 20, 2020. We will notify all applicants of their standing by September 26. If you have any questions, please use our contact form to ask!

Participating Instructors

Please note: instructors may change.

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Contributing Lecturers

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Refund Policy

If you find that you need to drop the class, you may do so by contacting our GMail or emailing via the website.

If you drop by September 1, 2020, you will receive a full refund minus a service fee.

If you drop by September 10, you will receive an 80% refund minus a service fee plus a chance to enroll in future Writing the Other classes at a discount before general tickets go on sale.

If you drop by September 18 you will receive an 40% refund minus a service fee plus a chance to enroll in future Writing the Other classes at a discount before general tickets go on sale.

If you drop on September 19 or after you will not have your registration fee refunded. However, you will be able to use the registration fee as credit for future classes.

Register Below

If you have a Gift Card, discount, or code to access tickets, please click the “Enter promo code” link in the Registration box below before you begin the process.  If the box below gives you trouble, click here to register on our Eventbrite page.