Star Trek and Star Wars: The Enlightenment Versus the Anti-Enlightenment

ISBN-13: 9781433197703 / Angielski / Twarda / 2022 / 124 str.

George Gonzalez

Opis

In Star Trek and Star Wars: The Enlightenment versus the Anti-Enlightenment, George A. Gonzalez shows that these two behemoths of popular culture put the Enlightenment and anti-Enlightenment before the viewing public. Star Trek is arguably the popular culture vehicle most reflective of the Enlightenment: a belief in political and social progress, leading to a society that is modern, classless, and totally free of gender and ethnic biases. The Star Wars franchise, meanwhile, is seemingly the artistic embodiment of the anti-Enlightenment: societal progress (to the extent that it occurs) is solely a function of technology and not a perfecting of justice and fairness. Gonzalez shows that this reflects the pessimism and demoralization underlying the Trump phenomenon and the rise of anti-democratic, virulent nationalism.

Spis treści

Introduction - The Hegel/ Marx Political Philosophy Paradigm - Praxis: Enlightenment versus the Anti- Enlightenment - Star Trek (Original Series) Against Patriarchy and Jim Crow - The Early Cold War and Star Trek (Original Series) - Star Trek and the Clash of Civilizations: Anti-Enlightenment versus Modernism (Universal Justice) - Nazi Takeover of America: The Man in the High Castle and Star Trek - Conclusion: The Trump Phenomenon and the Anti- Enlightenment - Bibliography - Index.

O autorze

George A. Gonzalez (Ph.D., University of Southern California, 1997) is Professor of Political Science at the University of Miami. He is the author of Star Trek and Popular Culture: Television at the Frontier of Social and Political Change in the 1960s (also published by Peter Lang).