A report in The Guardian asks: With the death of Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Heinlein and, now, Arthur C Clark, whose short story The Sentinel was made into that mega movie 2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968, which I watched three times (because I could understand it the first time around) has passed on, is there a future for science fiction? Ray Bradbury and Ursula LeGuin are also old.Well, apparently, Wikipedia now lists 43 sub-genres of science fiction though 'you must never call it sci-fi if you're talking to a fan', and new genres appear to be added every week. (Ask a fanboy -- or fangirl -- near you, and prepare to run.)
Here are a few (very few) definitions from Wikipedia and other sources:
Alternate history based on the premise that historical events might have turned out differently, using devices such as time travel to change the past, or set in another universe.
Biopunk uses elements from the hard-boiled detective novel, film noir, Japanese anime, and post-modernist prose to describe the nihilistic, underground side of the biotech society.
Clockpunk. There are two sub-sub-genres: Historical Clockpunk explores how the world would be if certain technological developments that occurred later had happened in the Renaissance. Non-historical Clockpunk is set in settings similar to the Renaissance but on alternative worlds or planets.
Cyberpunk includes advances in information technology and especially the Internet (cyberspace), artificial intelligence, bionic prosthetics and brain-computer interfaces, and post-democratic societal control.
The Guardian
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