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Science Fiction's Influence on Pop Culture

Science fiction is typically viewed as a genre or maybe a sub-culture, but a new book makes the case that science fiction after World War II is one of the most important and most under recognized influences on contemporary pop culture.

What's more, authorAlec Nevala-Lee argues that most of that influence was mediated by one man, John W. Campbell Junior, who edited one magazine that over the course of several decades that bore the names: Astounding, Astounding Stories, Astounding Science Fiction and finally Analog Science Fiction. Alec Nevala-Lee’s new book is also called Astounding. He joined us to talk about the topic. 

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Elsa Partan is a producer and newscaster with CAI. She first came to the station in 2002 as an intern and fell in love with radio. She is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. From 2006 to 2009, she covered the state of Wyoming for the NPR member station Wyoming Public Media in Laramie. She was a newspaper reporter at The Mashpee Enterprise from 2010 to 2013. She lives in Falmouth with her husband and two daughters.