How and when does there come to be an an­thropology of the alien?” This set of essays, written for the eighth J. Lloyd Eaton Confer­ence on Fantasy and Science Fiction, is con­cerned with the significance of that question. [Anthropology] is the science that must desig­nate the alien if it is to redefine a place for itself in the universe,” according to the Introduction. The idea of the alien is not new. In the Re­naissance, Montaigne’s purpose in describing an alien encounter was excorporationman­kind was the savage” because the artificial devices of nature controlled him. Shake­speare’s version of the alien encounter was in­corporation; his character of Caliban is brought to the artificial, political world of man and incor­porated into the body politic The essays in this volume . . . show, in their general orientation, that the tribe ofShakespeare still, in literary studies at least, outnumbers that of Montaigne.” These essays show the interrelation of the excorporating pos­sibilities to the internal soundings of the alien encounter within the human mind and form. This book is divided into three parts: Searchings: The Quest for the Alien” includes The Aliens in Our Mind,” by Larry Niven; Effing the Ineffable,” by Gregory Benford; Border Patrols,” by Michael Beehler; Alien Aliens,” by Pascal Ducommun; and Metamorphoses of the Dragon,” by George E. Slusser. Sightings: The Aliens among Us” includes Discriminating among Friends,” by John Huntington; Sex, Superman, Sociobiology,” by Joseph D. Miller; Cowboys and Telepaths,” by Eric S. Rabkin; Robots,” by Noel Perrin; Aliens in the Supermarket,” by George R. Guffey; and Aliens R’ U.S.,” by Zoe Sofia. Soundings: Man as the Alien” includes H. G. Wells’ Familiar Aliens,” by John R. Reed; Inspiration and Possession,” by Clayton Koelb; Cybernauts in Cyberspace,” by David Porush; The Human Alien,” by Leighton Brett Cooke; From Astarte to Barbie,” by Frank McConnell; and An Indication of Monsters;” by Colin Greenland.

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