Milk Duds

This is a satirical short story about Trump\u27s immigration policy

Feminist Extraterrestrials Establish Economic Utopia on Earth

This is flash fiction about a feminist monetary strategy

Something New Under The Sun: Episode 4

This is the introduction to Marleen S. Barr\u27s guest edited issue of DELETION: THE OPEN ACCESS ONLINE FORUM IN SCIENCE FICTION STUDIES. The issue is called Episode 4: The New! The Now! The Fantastic

Grace Paley, Octavia E. Butler, and Wendy Wasserstein in the CUNY Graduate Center Bathroom

This creative piece about book promotion describes how Grace Paley, Octavia E. Butler, Wendy Wasserstein, and the CUNY Graduate Center bathroom figure in Marleen S. Barr\u27s efforts to draw attention to her novels OY PIONEER! and OY FEMINIST PLANETS: A FAKE MEMOIR

Creating Room for A Singularity of Our Own: Reading Sue Lange\u27s We, Robots

The accessibility of Lange’s text might mitigate against recognizing its importance. Lange’s simple sentence structure and direct communicative mode convey a presently overlooked logical moral assertion: the impending Singularity is not a male-dominated patriarchal domain. The Singularity, in other words, should not be construed in a manner which excludes women and feminism. This assertion is patently obvious. But, nonetheless, it is often ignored. Before I read Lange’s novella as a description of the Singularity which feminists can embrace, I include the following background information: 1) a discussion about why the discourse relating to the Singularity needs to be expanded and 2) an introduction to Lange’s place within feminist science fiction

My Unfair Trumpie Closely Encounters \u27Julie Andrews\u27

This is a humorous short story about Trump

Donald Trump: Live from New Yawk

This is an article about why Donald Trump speaks like The Real Housewives of New York reality stars

Report From New York City

This is a science fiction scholar\u27s eyewitness account of the September 11, 2001 New York City attack

Oy It\u27s the Cosmetics, Stupid: Or How Estee Lauder Changed the Post 9/11 World

Professor Sondra Lear, the protagonist of my novels Oy Pioneer! (2003) and Oy Feminist Science Fiction (in press) – and some of my short fiction – appears in this story. I trot out Sondra whenever I imagine coping with reality in terms of science fictional premises. Sondra, then, is a Walter Mitty fantasy version of me. Yes, spending one’s professional life as a science fiction scholar is exceedingly interesting and exciting. But it does have its limitations. I can’t hang out with the feminist extraterrestrials who form the crux of my academic pursuits. I can’t beam up and down, time travel, or eat calorie free knishes which pop out of a spaceship food synthesizer. It is frustrating always at once to be so close and so galaxy-far-far away from these forever unreachable things. Sondra assuages this quandary. She enables me to position myself within a feminist science fiction scenario Holodeck. Through Sondra, I can dream my impossible feminist science fiction dream; fulfill my quest to follow that star. Carolyn Heilbrun’s mystery novel series protagonist Amanda Cross inspired me to create Sondra Lear. But, unlike Heilbrun, Cross is not Jewish. (Amanda Cross would never say “oy”—which happens to be my favorite word. Ditto for Sondra.) Departing from Heilbrun’s creative model, I decided to imbue Sondra with the full spectrum of my very strong New York Jewish cultural identity. She can be understood as something akin to a feminist version of Fran Drescher using her own life as a model to create Fran Fine, the nanny from Queens. Sondra Lear, then, is the spaceship venturing feminist science fiction scholar from Queens. Ms. Fine lands in an alien Manhattan townhouse which constitutes a different universe in relation to her mother’s plastic slipcovered couch. Professor Lear lands in different fantastic scenarios which function similarly in relation to my mother’s plastic slipcovered couch. Mothers form the center of Jewish women’s universes. In this story, I science-fictionally evoke the world of my mother’s youth on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. My mother went to high school with Lauren Bacall. She told me that after they got off the city bus they took to school, Bacall (a.k.a. Jewish New York girl Betty Joan Perske) sometimes came to her home on West End Avenue and enjoyed chatting with my grandfather. She also described how proud the New York Jewish community was when Bess Meyerson won the 1945 Miss America Pageant. So, when I was really standing on the F.D.R. Drive watching July 4th fireworks, I somehow connected the event to a spaceship inhabited by feminist extraterrestrials named Lauren and Bess. I called upon my trusty alter ego Professor Sondra Lear to engage with them – and other great Greatest Generation Jewish women I threw in for good measure. Sondra and I very much hope that you enjoy this story, which emanates from our real Jewish New York female personal and historical cultural inheritance. We are grateful to have the opportunity to share it with you

Pilgrim Through Space and Time

This is a short story which describes what happened when Marleen S. Barr received the Science Fiction Research Association Pilgrim Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction studies