Welcome to the Desert of the Real: An Exploration of Cyberpunk Literature Culture

This project aims to create a reader’s guide to help students be familiar with some fundamental concepts and works of cyberpunk literature. For this compilation, I will make use of existing openly licensed materials and also create some on my own. At the same time, I will create tasks and activities of three different kinds. These assignments will require students to demonstrate their understanding of essential terms and concepts, identify and analyze the usage of those terms and concepts in the primary texts, and imagine ways of using this learning in relation to their respective fields. The students’ activities, with their permission, will be incorporated in the OER. The project will operate in three phases – summer and fall 2020, and spring 2021. In the end, different publishing options will be considered to finalize the OER project.

Qazi Arka Rahman

2018-present Ph.D. student, Department of English, West Virginia University (WVU), USA

2015 MBA, Institute of Business Administration (IBA), University of Dhaka, Bangladesh

2013 M.A., Department of English, Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh

2012 B.A., Department of English, Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh

Qazi Arka Rahman is interested in the nexus of postcolonial literature, South Asian studies, and digital humanities. He is curious about the role of fiction in shaping the concepts of nation and nationality in modern South Asia and seeks to understand the multidimensional identity politics operating there. For his dissertation, he aims to bring in Bangladeshi literature in English and Bangla to expand conceptions of South Asian literary and postcolonial studies and broaden existing notions of South Asian identity while incorporating DH tools and methods. He is a firm believer in the power of narratives and actively tries to weave that philosophy into his pedagogical approach. He also enjoys critical studies of science fictions, films, popular culture, and loves anything cyberpunk. He was one of the speakers for the 2019-20 WVU Local to Global Film Series and 2020 WVU Isaac Asimov Collection Symposium. A recipient of WVU Summer Humanities Internships in 2021 & 2019, and 2020-21 Open Educational Resources (OER) Grant – Arka is also involved with the Eberly Writing Studio as a graduate studio consultant and serves as the VP of English Graduate Student Union (EGSU). Learn more at https://qazirahman.academia.edu/.