Should Science Fiction and Fantasy be in the Same Section?

By: Kameron McBride

Lets say you walk in the bookstore—those still exist right?—and go past the bestseller racks and head towards the fiction section. Typically, they will be grouped in sections such as
Adventure, Horror and Mystery. Eventually you'll stumble upon a section labeled Fantasy/Science Fiction, with a lot of colorful paperbacks with dragons or robots lumped together.

My question is: do these need to be put in the same section? I'm sure from a logistical perspective this makes sense when stocking the bookstore but does it make sense from a genre perspective? Lets start by looking at everything that is similar about the two genres:

*The audience for these are presumed to be similar (read: "geeky")

*The both deal with worlds that either did not or have not yet existed

And you know, that's generally all I can really find that's different about the two. There may be more minor similarities that typically run together but for the most part I don't think they actually run together that much. For example, here are the things that are typically different about the two:

*Fantasy is normally focused on the past, Science Fiction the future

*Fantasy deals in archetypes a lot more, which feeds into the whole past thing. Most often we see certain races or kinds of people consistently portrayed the same way, while science fiction seems to be an evolving genre, which consistently takes on new forms.

*As the names suggest, science fiction bends realistic things, while fantasy is more of the creating new things mode (e.g. magic). 

*Science Fiction tends to be a little more cerebral than Fantasy. That's not a knock towards Fantasy and there are some very thought–provoking works, it's just Science Fiction works on a more abstract scale sometimes.

Again, there are more things but I think these three are the biggest differences between the two genres.

There are certainly times when the two genres can kind of blend together. Something like Star Wars is a good example. Before George Lucas explained "The Force" as mediclorians or something like that, the Jedi kind of seemed like wizard–knights using magic. Other than some examples, however, the two genres don't seem to really blend together all that much.

This probably shouldn't exist

So I guess this is my beef: science fiction and fantasy are put together for the most part because the fit under the "geek" umbrella. This isn't a huge issue but I definitely think the two genres don't necessarily need to be lumped in together. It could stand for them to have their own seperate sections. 

My point being: I don't think these books should just be lumped together. They are two different genres with distinct styles that are writing to different audiences. Don't get me wrong, a lot of science fiction and fantasy fans interact but it seems like you generally like one category more than the other.

So, in conclusion, I think it's fair that bookstores want to put the categories together in order to save space but from a genre perspective I think these two are pretty far apart now. They deal with different issues, portray vastly different kinds of characters and have their separate set of genre conventions. As such, I don't think it's fair to assume they are similar to the point where they are the same genre but instead two genres working with a somewhat similar audience.