ELO-C5522 - Worldbuilding, Lecture, 2.5.2023-26.5.2023
This course space end date is set to 26.05.2023 Search Courses: ELO-C5522
Topic outline
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WORLDBUILDING 2023
Course content
Worldbuilding course is a cross-disciplinary collaborational experiment on how to build an imaginary (populated) world, that can act as an inspiration and source for different narratives.The focus is on how to communicate during the process to create consistent concept of this world and how to present it to an outside audience with visual, audial, textual or other means. The teams will start with pre-defined loose frame, and work within this frame to create the world(s). The course duration is four weeks. Course content consists of lectures by visitors, excursions, group discussions and independent hands-on work. Visiting lecturers provide unique viewpoints to worldbuilding from their respective fields of expertise. Existing cases of imaginary worlds of literature, performing arts, cinema and gaming are also explored and analyzed during the course.
Learning outcomes
The art and craft of worldbuilding has many useful applications for writers and designers. This course gives inspiration on how to experiment on developing and combining ideas to create a consistent imaginary world, and how to present this world via visual, auditory, and other examples.During the course students are encouraged to learn new ways of collaboration that can break traditional boundaries between disciplines.
This year’s theme: climate fiction
Worldbuilding course has had a different theme each year, and this year’s theme is climate fiction. The students are asked to familiarize themselves with the genre and think about it in relation to their own work.
2023: the year AI broke?
During the planning of this year’s Worldbuilding course different AI tools available to general public have advanced tremendously. The nature of these tools and their impact(s) on our industries remains to be seen and this will surely be one of the topics discussed many times during the course. Knowing this, this year’s Worldbuilding course is decided to be a (mostly) low-tech learning environment. The students are encouraged to use only pen & paper and other non-electric technologies during the course. The reason for this is to hopefully make us more aware of the influence the tools we use have on our work and thinking.
Hybrid course
Most of this year’s Worldbuilding lectures will be held in Otaniemi, but some events and checkpoint sessions will be online only. The lectures are not recorded or streamed.
Schedule
General note on the schedule: we aim to start the day at 10:00 sharp, but if everyone is already present, we can start even earlier. Ho harm oin showing up early, if possible! The duration of each day is about 7 hours, including lunch. 17:30 is the absolute latest time the day program ends, but depending on circumstances the day could end also earlier. Some exceptions apply!
Each day with scheduled lecture or screening programme includes also a daily task assignment, presentations and discussion.
Tuesday 2.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101
Course info and introductions
Jyrki Pylväs: Experiments and experiences in worldbuilding
Jyrki Pylväs (b.1973) graduated from University of Art and Design in Helsinki (now part of Aalto University) in 2000, majoring in Design for Theatre and Television. Working as a freelancer since 1997, he’s done a lot of stage & costume design for theatre, dance and circus performances. His personal artistic work has moved towards media art in the past decade or so, causing him to venture out into the fields of concept creation, game design and especially augmented reality. He also teaches regularily, makes award-winning real ciders and is an aspiring hobbyist beekeeper.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jyrki-pylv%C3%A4s-378293a7/
Wednesday 3.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101
Vilja Autiokyrö: Improvisation as a worldbuilding tool
Vilja Autiokyrö (b.1983) is Helsinki based screenwriter and a director. She has studied screenwriting and directing in Aalto University, ELO Film School Finland. She has worked as a screenwriter for television series and wrote & directed short documentary and fiction films, music videos and audio dramas. Vilja is especially interested in dark and anarchistic humour, metaphors and imaginary worlds.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/vilja-autiokyr%C3%B6-1b7a51a6/
Course work assignment
Thursday 4.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101
J.Pekka Mäkelä: Building the world you need, not the world you want
Novelist, scriptwriter, English-to-Finnish literary translator. Also worked as a photographer, layout designer and made music for (e.g.) theatre. Specialties: Published eight novels during the last 15 years. Translated more than 60 titles during the last 20 years, including Sci-Fi, mainstream novels, musical biographies, science etc. His novel ”Hunan” was shortlisted for Finlandia literary award for the best novel of 2018.
https://www.yrttimaa.net/books.html
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Pekka_M%C3%A4kel%C3%A4 (in Finnish)
Friday 5.5. 11:00-17:00 (Online only! - link to be provided later)
Note on screening the lecture: the students are required to screen to lecture sharing the same physical space with their group members. Väre Q101 classroom is available.
Maria Joutsenvirta: Civilization as wealth
Maria Joutsenvirta, PhD, Researcher, Author and Transformative Learning Designer
(affiliation: Aalto BIZ/Sustainability-in-Business)
https://mariajoutsenvirta.wordpress.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/maria-joutsenvirta-70885599/
Monday 8.5.
Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Tuesday 9.5. 10:00-14:00 Kino Tapiola (Mäntyviita 2, Espoo)
Film screening: The Memory of Water (Veden vartija), dir. Saara Saarela
In this dystopian literary adaptation, a courageous young woman fights for fresh water in the Scandinavian Union, an area that has dried up due to environmental disaster and a repressive military government.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11969576/
Discussion with director Saara Saarela after the film
https://people.aalto.fi/fi/saara.saarela
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0754330/
Wednesday 10.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101
Hanna-Riikka Roine: Theories and Experiments of Fictional Worldbuilding
Hanna-Riikka Roine (PhD, literary studies) works in Tampere University as a Postdoctoral
Research Fellow funded by the Academy of Finland and Principal Investigator of the project Imagine, Democracy! Narrative Fiction as a Tool for Imagining Democracy in Finland (Kone Foundation). She is also the editor-in-chief of the journal Avain - Finnish Review of Literary Studies. Roine's current research explores the ways in which our entanglement with digital media affects, guides, and shapes our engagement with the possible. She has published articles, for instance, on the limits of narrating environmental technologies in science fiction and on social media platforms as contexts for different uses of narrative.
Hanna's research profile: https://researchportal.tuni.fi/en/persons/hanna-riikka-roine
Imagine, Democracy! project (in Finnish): https://projects.tuni.fi/kuvitteledemokratia/
Thursday 11.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101
Janne Laine: creating soundworlds
Janne Laine is a film sound designer/sound editor/re-recording mixer/occasional composer with 25 years of experience working with documentaries and fiction films.
Varying audio interests, from tweaking the synthesizer to recording bugs and cemetery gates with contact microphones, and trying to achieve the best dialogue tone ever. Also amplified, distorted electric guitar.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0481845
Friday 12.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Monday 15.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Tuesday 16.5. Checkpoint 1 (Online only, link to be provided later)
Wednesday 17.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Thursday 18.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Friday 19.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Monday 22.5. Checkpoint 2 (Online only, link to be provided later)
Tuesday 23.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Wednesday 24.5. Independent groupwork on course work assignment
Thursday 25.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101 Course work presentations
Friday 26.5. 10:00-17:00 Väre Q101 Course work presentations, course conclusion and feedback
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Worldbuilding
COURSE WORK ASSIGNMENT 2023
Make a presentation of a fictional world. The world must be a premise, not just a background for a story! The theme for this year's Worldbuilding course is climate fiction. Try to found out ways to incorporate the theme or genre of climate fiction into your world.
Prepare the basic idea for the world and tell what it is like. Choose a starting point or ”what if?” type of question and start building your world around it.
Is the world hermetic, mimetic or a hybrid of both?
What is the theme or subtext of the world? Why does it exist? What is the dilemma or problem that is embodied in the world?
What is the ecology, history, culture, technology etc. in your world like? How do these interact with each other? How do these affect the inhabitants of your world?
Find places or situations inside your world that can be used as starting points for stories. Is there a condition or force in your world that can drive stories forward?
Use verbal and audiovisual means to present your world to others. Use both original content produced by yourself and source material available. Present also the facts or theories you're basing your world on.
The groups will have a whole day for working on the idea 8.5., but start discussions and writing down ideas already before that. Make observations and share ideas with your group members.
Each group will have two online checkpoint sessions, where your idea and progress is discussed with the teacher. The checkpoint sessions will take place 17.5. and 22.5.
The works will be presented for the whole group, teachers and possible guests 25.5. and 26.5. The presentations are followed by discussion and a small daily task for everyone present. The full duration for presentation, discussion & task is about 2,5 to 3 hours.
Send short description of your idea (not more than 100 words) by email:
Deadline for idea descriptions is Monday 8.5. by 22:00.