Definitions of Science Fiction

"Science fiction deals with scientists working at science in the future" (Asimov 21).

"Science fiction stories are extraordinary voyages into any of the infinite supply of conceivable futures" (Asimov 23).

"Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology" (Asimov 76).

"SF is . . . a literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and whose main formal device is an imaginative framework alternative to the author's empirical environment" (italics in original) (Suvin 8-9)

Science fiction is "a fictional tale determined by the hegemonic literary device of a locus and/or dramatis personae that (1) are radically or at least significantly different from the empirical times, places, and characters of the "mimetic" or "naturalist" fiction, but (2) are nonetheless--to the extent that SF differs from other "fantastic" genres, that is, ensembles of fictional tales without empirical validation--simultaneously perceived as not impossible within the cognitive (cosmological and anthropological) norms of the author's epoch. Basically, SF is a developed oxymoron, a realistic irreality, with humanized nonhumans, this-worldly Other Worlds, and so forth." (Suvin viii)

Science fiction is "Fiction dealing principally with the impact of actual or imagined science upon society or individuals, or more generally, literary fantasy including a scientific factor as an essential orienting component. Such literature may consist of a careful and informed extrapolation of scientific facts and principles, or it may range into farfetched areas flatly contradictory of such facts and principles. In either case, plausibility based on science is a requisite" ("Science Fiction," Merriam-Webster's)

Works Cited

Asimov, Isaac. Asimov on Science Fiction. Doubleday, 1981.

"Science Fiction." Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature, 1995. Literature Resource Center. Gale Group. 21 Aug. 2001. Accessed: http://www.galenet.com/servlet/LitRC.

Suvin, Darko. Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre. Yale UP, 1980.

Articles on Science Fiction and Fantasy