Weird Fictions Research Group

Head: Dr. Agnieszka Kotwasińska Vice-head: Joanna Kaniewska

Weird Fictions Research Group emerged in early 2020 out of the W.E.I.R.D. Students’ Reading Group which was established in 2018 at the American Studies Center, the University of Warsaw.

Our research group invites students and early career researchers interested in all types of weird fictions.

If you enjoy weird fiction, SF, horror, and fantasy, our research group is a place for you! Join our discussions, movie screenings, seminars, guest lectures, and special events. We meet twice every month.

Our Fall 2018 schedule was devoted to questions of taste and paranoid reading, SF graphic novels, nostalgia and 80s animation. In the spring of 2019 we looked at cyber-punk and the posthuman. During Fall 2019 we discussed body horror in different cultural texts. In Spring 2020 we talked about hybridity, monstrosity and transgression in SFF/horror/the weird and in Fall we organized a series of meetings called “EcoGothic Landscapes.” In Spring 2021 we discussed monsters monsters, both old and new, as part of our “Monsters ReVisited” series. Academic year 2021/22 was devoted to SF in music and music in SF. We launched “Weird Music” and “Weird Music Vol. 2,” a series of talks and meetings about horror in music and music in horror. In March 2023, we launched “Mythos, Inc.”, a series of talks about Greek and Roman myths in contemporary American culture. The 2023/24 academic year was devoted in its entirety to “Weird Medicine” and biomedical imaginaries in American culture.

During the 2024/25 academic year, we’ll be looking into “Weird TV” on streaming platforms and on classic television, cultural representations of television, analog and/or VHS horror, nostalgic representations of 1980s/1990s TV cultures, and other TV-related weirdness.

OZN points

ASC students receive 3 OZN points for attending each meeting organized by the WFRG (2 OZN if the meeting’s online.)

If a student plans, organizes, and delivers a workshop/lecture as part of the WFRG, they complete the requirements to receive a grade of 5 for the OZN course.

In order to have the grade entered into USOS, the student must first present their OZN card to the WFRG Head for a written confirmation, and ask the WFRG director to send a message confirming the presentation to both the student and Dr. Usiekniewicz (OZN Coordinator). Secondly, the student needs to follow the steps outlined on the ASC’s OZN website section, i.e. submit all the following documents in one email addressed both to the OZN Coordinator, Dr. Marta Usiekniewicz (m.usiekniewicz@uw.edu.pl) and the Student Office represented by Aleksandra Gniadzik-Smolińska for students with names starting A-Ł (a.gniadzik-smolinska@uw.edu.pl) or Agnieszka Żmijewska-Czajka for students with names starting M-Ż (aczajka@uw.edu.pl):

1. Scan of completed OZN card signed by the WFRG Head
2. Copy of the confirmation email sent by the WFRG Head
(further details on obtaining a grade for OZN are available on the ASC website: https://www.asc.uw.edu.pl/students/open-academic-sessions/)

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