Science and religion in anti utopias and their use in classroom

Anti utopian literature which has been the subject matter of this study has become extensively popular in the years following the two annihilating world wars and subsequent developments. Although it is possible to comb literature and find out the early examples of anti utopias in the Ancient Greek Literature, the first canonical work is Mary Shelley?s `Frankenstein? which was written in the years following the groundbreaking Industrial Revolution. The anti utopian writer as a member of the real society is inevitably affected by the social, economic and political problems strives to warn the readers to take precautions to prevent the awaiting problems he prophesized. He depicts a fictive model of a nightmarish society which confronts with the aggravated version of the problems the real society experiences. Anti utopian themes are varied; yet, as the title of this study may imply, here only themes related to science and religion have been discussed. The menaces of scientific developments and misuse of technology, computerization, the dominance of machines, genetics can be exemplified for the employment of `science? in anti utopias while loss of faith, manipulation of religion, the image of a Saviour have been the most frequently used themes of `religion? in anti utopian narratives. In the first part of this study, the concept of anti utopia and its historical background have been examined besides the themes of `science? and `religion? in anti utopian novels. In the second part of the thesis, six selected anti utopian novels between 1950-2008 have been explored with regard to the themes of `science? and `religion?. The timeline between 1950-2008 is divided into three parts; 1950-1970, 1971-1990 and 1991-2008. Two anti utopian novels from each period are studied in correspondence with the social events and developments of the time they were written in. Thus, it is aimed to find out if there is parallelism between the experiences of the real society and the fictive anti utopian society. As the use of literary texts in teaching has been proven to be helpful to linguistic, psychological and intellectual development, in the third part the classroom implications of anti utopian fiction are tried to be exemplified with activities based on the selected novels.Key words: anti utopias, science, religion, classroom activities