Science fiction in literature: (not just) about space ships and time travel

What exactly is science fiction? Does any book with a scientific focus qualify? Is it always about space ships and time travel? According to Roger Luckhurst, “SF is a literature of technologically saturated societies”, and Darko Suvin considers it a genre “whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and whose formal device is an imaginative framework alternative to the author’s empirical environment.” In this lecture, Dr. Leanne Rae Darnbrough (KU Leuven) will discuss the different boundaries of the science fiction genre as well as its history. She will define, historicise and critique the genre as it has developed following Mary Shelley’s 1818 epistolary novel Frankenstein.

It is recommended, but not required, to read Mary Shelley's Frankenstein in preparation. This lecture is an introduction to the lecture series Science Fiction(s): from neurons to novae.