Call for Papers

SCIENCE FICTION IN BRITISH FILM AND TELEVISION Area

2008 Film & History Conference

"Film & Science: Fictions, Documentaries, and Beyond"

October 30-November 2, 2008

Chicago, Illinois

<http://www.filmandhistory.org>www.filmandhistory.org

First-Round Deadline: November 1, 2007



AREA: Science Fiction in British Film and Television



The consistent quality of science-fiction films and television programs in 

Britain has won audiences for generations, both in the UK and around the 

world. One reason for this sustained popularity lies in the ability of 

British cinema and TV to constantly reinvent the genre, keeping it socially 

and philosophically elastic. How, for example, has British science fiction 

adapted to changes in the political and social climate or affected national 

policy or civic character? How have SF films and television programs 

represented Britain's concerns about the present or future or about the use 

and perception of history?  What makes science fiction film and television 

in Britain distinctively "British"?



This area treats the last century of science fiction productions, from 

Maurice Elvey's The Tunnel (1935) and William Cameron Menzies' Things to 

Come (1936) to the landmark TV productions The Quatermass Experiment 

(1953), 1984 (1954), A for Andromeda (1961), and the latest Doctor Who. 

Presentations may feature analyses of individual films and/or TV programs, 

surveys of documents related to their production, analyses of history and 

culture as explored through a set of films/TV programs, or comparisons 

between two or more science-fiction productions.



Paper topics might include utopian and dystopian films/TV programs, future 

warfare, censorship, representation of non-human life forms, politics, the 

Cold War, science-fiction after 9/11, ethics and morals, representations of 

science and scientists, myths and legends, terrorism, early science 

fiction, adaptations, comedy, government and institutions, disasters, 

environment, gender, ethnicity, race, class, etc.



Please send your 200-word proposal by November 1, 2007 to



Tobias Hochscherf, Chair, Science Fiction in British Film and TV

Northumbria University

School of Arts and Social Sciences

Media & Communication

Lipman Bldg.

Newcastle upon Tyne

NE1 8ST

United Kingdom

Phone: ++44(0)191-227-4932

Email: [log in to unmask]



Panel proposals for up to four presenters are also welcome, but each 

presenter must submit his or her own paper proposal. Deadline for 

first-round proposals: November 1, 2007



This area, comprising multiple panels, is a part of the 2008 biennial Film 

& History Conference, sponsored by The Center for the Study of Film and 

History. Speakers will include founder John O'Connor and editor Peter C. 

Rollins (in a ceremony to celebrate the transfer to the University of 

Wisconsin Oshkosh), and Wheeler Winston Dixon, James Ryan Professor of Film 

Studies at University of Nebraska, Lincoln, and author of Visions of the 

Apocalypse and Disaster and Memory. For updates and registration 

information about the upcoming meeting, see the Film & History website 

(http://www.filmandhistory.org).



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Screen-L is sponsored by the Telecommunication & Film Dept., the

University of Alabama: http://www.tcf.ua.edu









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Screen-L is sponsored by the Telecommunication & Film Dept., the

University of Alabama: http://www.tcf.ua.edu