As an English discipline we continually examine the representation of women, BIPOC, and LGBT+ in our curriculum.

During the 9th and 10th grade humanities redesign a few years ago, our discipline went back and forth on text selection for the courses.  During this process, the spring trimester Origins and Authority courses each needed a text that was contemporary and forward thinking. Orwell’s 1984 was a great fit for Authority. It built on the concepts established in The Odyssey and The Epic of Gilgamesh and explore possible future civilizations. For Origins, I ended up initially selecting Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, a text that explores a future civilization and answer questions such as ‘What does it mean to be human?’ and how has our understanding of reality change over the millennia.  It seemed like a great fit and one that would dovetail nicely with the exploration of humanities early civilizations in Mesopotamia.

Elena Olsen and I spoke about my suggestion to select Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and, while it was a great fit, we discussed the need to include more female and diverse authors into our booklists.  I went back to the drawing board looking at texts that explored our humanity in a futuristic setting, and came up with the usual; Asimov, Heinlein, Bradbury, Gibson, a field dominated my male writers. 

I then stumbled upon Martha Wells,  a writer of science fiction since the early 1990’s and winner of four Hugo Awards and two Nebula Awards.  She had just published All Systems Red, a novella set in the future and featuring a self-aware artificial intelligence.  At just over 150 pages and written with a younger audience in mind All Systems Red developed a unique look into the question of our humanity in a way that was poignant, at times humorous, and most importantly engaging to our students.  

The students responded positively to All Systems Red. They found it easy to read and digest and it was nice to read a text that was more geared towards a young adult audience. I appreciate Elena for promoting female gender representation in the texts we select for students, and am more cognizant about taking into account the author’s gender and cultural background when revising and designing curricula.