I wonder if anyone here has a judgement on the reliability and credibility of the "
memory-alpha.org". I have referred to it informally for many years for ST esoterica, but am now trying to determine if I can use it as a basis for statements I make in this class. I don't need it to be a recognized authority, just a good faith judgement that it usually provides reliable information.
Thanks for the feedback to my initial post.
"The Naked Time" is almost a perfect introduction to TOS, and for a while I planned on opening with that - and I might still if I find a suitable TNG episode to pair it with. The problem is that I just despise "The Naked Now" episode, and can not bear to introduce TNG to virgins with that. To be fair, I have not seen it in a long time (if it ever popped up as a rerun when I was watching those I would turn it off); I will give it another spin when I start reviewing the TNG in sequence next week and and see if it wears better. I will, in any case, use clips from TNN about Data and Yar in my unit on Star Trek Sex.
I do have to keep reminding myself that this is, in the end, a psychology course and not a course in Star Trek; so most of the time I have to select episodes that have some direct relationship to and illustration of the psychological themes and readings assigned for the week. The only excuse I have to show episodes that do not directly relate to assigned reading is the first week, since I will not yet have been able to assign anything. That is why I am leaning towards City and Inner Light - two of my favorite episodes from both series, each of which have a general psychological sensibility, but no direct relation to the reading I will be assigning.
I will be addressing racism one week, so will of course be assigning "Battlefield", and will show the clip from Plato's Stepchildren, along with an extended lecture and clips of a number of episodes from both TOS and TNG about the Prime Directive, and its relationship to a kind of neo-colonialism.
I will likely use clips from several of the episodes David mentioned - I do wish "Dagger" was better. "Chain of Command II" is an absolute must - I will pair that with clips from some other episodes on torture and "brainwashing".
I love Best of Both Worlds and Family so much that I will probably spend one whole class period just screening them back to back to back. Will do something similar with Space Seed and Wrath of Kahn.
I have a week devoted to Memory, which will probably highlight "Conundrum", with clips from some others.
I also have a week on Artificial Intelligence, which will probably focus on "The Measure of a Man" - but there are obviously a whole bunch of other good episodes to draw from - I have a soft spot for the one where Data decides not to tell his "mother" that she is an android, and I will probably show a clip montage of Kirk talking computers to death with paradoxes and illogic from the 4 or 5 episodes in which he uses that strategy (including one of my all time favorite Star Trek lines, from Spock: "Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers which smell BAD". I may just go ahead and show all of "I, Mudd", which I still liked when watching it again the other day).