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Star Trek PhD Thesis Wins Academic Prize

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the who-said-watching-tv-rots-yer-brain dept.

An anonymous reader writes "A PhD thesis based on Star Trek has won an Australian university's top academic prize. Dr Djoymi Baker's 90,000 word dissertation 'Broadcast Space: TV Culture, Myth and Star Trek' was awarded the University of Melbourne's Chancellor's Prize for Excellence in the PhD. Dr Baker watched over 700 Star Trek episodes — more than 624 hours — to investigate the relationship between ancient mythology and today's popular culture. American academics thought her research was 'superlative' and suitable for teaching."

5 of 348 comments (clear)

  1. Star Trek linked to pedophilia? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    This has very little to do with the article, but the L.A. Times recently published an article regarding the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit that focused on their fight against child pornography ("Sifting Clues to an Unsmiling Girl"). They are the law enforcement organization that photoshopped the victims out of child porn photos in order to get the public's assistance in identifying the backgrounds (it worked). In any case, the article had this amazing claim:

    On one wall is a "Star Trek" poster with investigators' faces substituted for the Starship Enterprise crew. But even that alludes to a dark fact of their work: All but one of the offenders they have arrested in the last four years was a hard-core Trekkie.

    Wow. All but one in four years. Seemed rather unlikely to me.

    So, I called the Child Exploitation Section of the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit and spoke to Det. Ian Lamond, who was familiar with the Times article. He claims they were misquoted, or if that figure was given it was done so jokingly. Of course, even if the figure was given jokingly, shouldn't the Times reporter have clarified something that seems rather odd? Shouldn't her editors have questioned her sources?

    Nevertheless, Det. Lamond does confirm that a majority of those arrested show "at least a passing interest in Star Trek, if not a strong interest." They've arrested well over one hundred people over the past four years and they can gauge this interest in Star Trek by the arrestees' "paraphenalia, books, videotapes and DVDs."

    Det. Constable Warren Bulmer slips on a Klingon sash and shield they confiscated in a recent raid. "It has something to do with a fantasy world where mutants and monsters have power and where the usual rules don't apply," Bulmer reflects. "But beyond that, I can't really explain it."

    I asked Det. Lamond if this wasn't simply a general interest in science fiction and fantasy, such as Star Wars or Harry Potter or similar. Paraphrasing his answer, he said, while there was sometimes other science fiction and fantasy paraphenalia, Star Trek was the most consistent and when he referred to a majority of the arrestees being Star Trek fans, it was Star Trek-specific.

    1. Re:Star Trek linked to pedophilia? by JockTroll · · Score: -1, Troll

      It shouldn't surprise anyone. Trekkie = geek. Geek = weak, spineless coward = pedophile.

      One more good reason to beat the crap out of them until their noses bleed for a month.

      Show no mercy towards nerds: they deserve none. They're mediocre, they're losers, their lack of social skills parallels their lack of skills in any area. Their "pursuit of intellectual interest" is only a façade, since they do not possess the intelligence to do anything worthwhile, only a perception of it.

      The image of the "geek genius" is a media-spawned myth which should have died a natural death by now. It is clear to anyone that a geek is simply a sub-par excuse for a human being with an annoying complex of superiority he can't be cured of.

      This however doesn't change their fate: they are derided, publicly humilated and beaten. As they should be. Leave them to their dreams of revenge, concocted between one garbage bag and the other.

      --
      Geeks are so full of shit that "beating the crap out of them" takes a whole new meaning.
  2. In before... by brouski · · Score: 0, Troll

    In before CleverNickname.

    --
    Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
  3. Next up by eclectro · · Score: -1, Troll

    Dr Baker watched over 700 Star Trek episodes -- more than 624 hours

    Did she see the episode where Kirk says at a Trek convention;

    "You know, before I answer any more questions there's something I wanted to say. Having received all your letters over the years, and I've spoken to many of you, and some of you have traveled... y'know... hundreds of miles to be here, I'd just like to say... GET A LIFE, will you people? I mean, for crying out loud, it's just a TV show! I mean, look at you, look at the way you're dressed! You've turned an enjoyable little job, that I did as a lark for a few years, into a COLOSSAL WASTE OF TIME!"

    Kirk said it. Not me. Don't mod me down.

    --
    Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
  4. 700 Star Trek episodes??? by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 0, Troll

    Who is he kidding? When the series ended in 1969 there were only 80 episodes. The so-called 'derivitive' series' came many years later and are a completely different kind of television. They're kind of the equivalent, frankly, of Star Trek remade the way a Woman's Studies department would redo it in 1989. . . Not necessarily a bad thing in all regards, but definitely not Star Trek.

    I guess there was a brand-name there that really begged to be capitalized on. Let's not get carried away with it, though.