Star Trek is an enduring icon in American popular culture. For many viewers, the science fiction series represents the bold exploration of the unknown and the humanistic respect of the foreign and the alien. In fact, it is Star Trek's vision of a utopian future where humans no longer engage in racism, sexism, capitalism, among other "-isms" that many fans claim is the main reason for their loyalty. But is the visionary Trek future world truly colorblind?

Star Trek and History traces the shifting and reforming meaning of race articulated throughout the Star Trek television series, feature films, and fan community. Daniel Bernardi investigates and politicizes the presentation of race in Star Trek in the original series of the 1960s, the feature films and television spin-offs of the 1980s and 1990s, and the current fan community on the Internet. Through both critical and historical analysis, the book proposes a method of studying the framing of race in popular film and television that integrates sociology, critical theory, and cultural studies.

Bernardi examines the representational and narrative functions of race in Star Trek and explores how the meaning of race in the science fiction series has been facilitated or constrained by creative and network decision-making, by genre, by intertextuality, and by fans. He interprets how the changing social and political movements of the times have influenced the production and meaning of Trek texts and the ways in which the ongoing series negotiated and reflected these turbulent histories. Most significantly, Bernardi tells us why is it important for readers to better understand the articulation of race in this enduring icon of American popular culture.

DANIEL L. BERNARDI is a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Film and Television at the University of California-Los Angeles. He is the editor of The Birth of Whiteness: Race and the Emergence of United States Cinema (Rutgers University Press, 1996).

Bernardi's thoughtful and provocative analysis of race in Star Trek is wholly original; it challenges viewers to see the series in a new light, and challenges its creators to be more mindful of the implicit messages in their work.

Bernardi boldly goes where no scholar has gone before and discovers racial anxiety at the center of the Star Trek story. This careful reading of commercial culture's quintessential mega-text provides invaluable insight into how mass media productions help shape us into the people we are.

Daniel Bernardi has dissected the history of a myth. If we are ever to track down and expose our semi-conscious racist evasions and dissemblings, we need more books like this one.

I would have sworn that there was little new any scholar could say about Star Trek. I was wrong. Bernardi opens up a rich new set of issues for scholarly examination, centering around the contradictory expression of race within the series and the fan culture that surrounds us. His analysis is bold, provocative, and challenging, yet consistently fair-minded. He combines a fan's detailed knowledge of the programÆs universe with the theoretical sophistication necessary to make this book a cutting-edge contribution to the cultural studies of race.

An original and insightful exploration of a major component of contemporary American culture.