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Title details for Star Trek by M. Keith Booker - Available

Star Trek

A Cultural History

by M. Keith Booker
ebook
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First airing in 1966, with a promise to "boldly go where no man has gone before," Star Trek would eventually become a bona fide phenomenon. Week after week, viewers of the series tuned in to watch Captain Kirk, Spock, and the rest of the crew of the USS Enterprise as they conducted their five-year mission in space. Their mission was cut short by a corporate monolith that demanded higher ratings, but Star Trek lived on in syndication, ultimately becoming a multibillion-dollar media franchise. With merchandise spin-offs, feature films, and several television iterations—from The Next Generation to Discovery—Star Trek is a firmly established part of the American cultural landscape.
In Star Trek: A Cultural History, M. Keith Booker offers an intriguing account of the series from its original run to its far-reaching impact on society. By placing the Star Trek franchise within the context of American history and popular culture, the author explores how the series engaged with political and social issues such as the Vietnam War, race, gender, and the advancement of technology. While this book emphasizes the original series, it also addresses the significance of subsequent programs, as well as the numerous films and extensive array of novels, comic books, and merchandise that have been produced in the decades since.
A show that originally resonated with science fiction fans, Star Trek has also intrigued the general public due to its engaging characters, exciting plotlines, and vision of a better future. It is those exact elements that allowed Star Trek to go from simply a good show to the massive media franchise it is today. Star Trek: A Cultural History will appeal to scholars of media, television, and popular culture, as well as to fans of the show.

  • Creators

  • Series

    The Cultural History of Television

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    September 15, 2018

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781538112762
      • File size: 32154 KB

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781538112762
      • File size: 32154 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Booklist

      September 1, 2018
      Booker explores the huge cultural impact the Star Trek franchise has had over the last five decades. Focusing primarily on the original series, which aired from 1966 to 1969, Booker points out that in its original run, Star Trek didn't have a large enough viewership to stay on the air for more than three seasons. The show truly found its audience in syndication in the 1970s, and its most prominent form of cultural impact is the number of spin-off series, movies, books, and other media it produced. The original Star Trek was very much a product of the 1960s, progressive in the way it portrayed humans working together in harmony across racial and cultural lines. But by today's standards, it seems to be nonetheless mired in gender and racial stereotypes as well as political allegories for the contemporaneous Cold War and Vietnam War. Enduring love for Star Trek has inspired everything from affectionate spoof films, including Galaxy Quest (1999), to conventions attended by thousands of fans. Trekkers will love this thoughtful study of their favorite franchise's cultural influence.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

Formats

  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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