What makes science fiction genres better than others at challenging social conventions, especially gender? Are speculative works structured differently when addressed to traditionally under-portrayed individuals or communities? This collection of interviews elicits truly honest and thought-provoking responses that focus on the biographical dimension in speculative fiction, questions of intersectionality, genre (re)definitions and the politicization of fiction. It gives voice to women of different races, nations, classes and sexual orientations who write and edit speculative fiction – such as Ellen Datlow, Kathe Koja, Angela Mi Young Hur, Eugen Bacon, and Cat Rambo. The interviews clarify how the junction of genre and gender is a key element to understanding this literary field, while simultaneously contextualizing and theorizing the interview itself, as a literary genre and a research tool.

This book contributes to the prominent interdisciplinary domain of Cosmopolitan Studies with 20 innovative essays by humanities scholars from all over the world that re-examine theories and practices of cosmopolitanism from a variety of perspectives. The volume satisfies the need for a stronger involvement of Comparative and World Literatures and Cultures, Translation, and Education Theories in this crucial debate, and also proposes an experimental way to explore in depth the necessity of a cosmopolitan method as well as the riches of cosmopolitan representations. The essays follow a logical progression from the situated philosophical and political foundations of the debate to interdisciplinary propositions for a pedagogy of cosmopolitanism through studies of modern and contemporary cosmopolitan cultural practices in literature and the arts and the concurrent analysis of prototypes of cosmopolitan identities. This trajectory allows readers to appreciate new historical, theoretical, aesthetic, and practical implications of cosmopolitanism that pertain to multiple genres and media, under different modes of production and reception. In the deterritorialized landscape of Migrating Minds, mental and sentimental mobility, rather than the legacy of place, is the key to an efficient, humanist response to deadening globalization.

What makes science fiction genres better than others at challenging social conventions, especially gender? Are speculative works structured differently when addressed to traditionally under-portrayed individuals or communities? This collection of interviews elicits truly honest and thought-provoking responses that focus on the biographical dimension in speculative fiction, questions of intersectionality, genre (re)definitions and the politicization of fiction. It gives voice to women of different races, nations, classes and sexual orientations who write and edit speculative fiction – such as Ellen Datlow, Kathe Koja, Angela Mi Young Hur, Eugen Bacon, and Cat Rambo. The interviews clarify how the junction of genre and gender is a key element to understanding this literary field, while simultaneously contextualizing and theorizing the interview itself, as a literary genre and a research tool.