u/Mictlantecuhtli

For context, I am an archaeologist with a BA and MA in Anthropology. My specialty is West Mexican archaeology.

A good example mostly because I am rewatching Enterprise and just finished the episode.

Every time Star Trek does a period piece planet episode they always drop the ball when it comes to cultural development divergence from Earth's own history. Culture does not remain static, it is always dependent on group consensus, acceptance, resistance, and creation. Even low level populations undergo cultural change.

Episode summary:

>!In "North Star" people from Earth's 19th century are taken to another planet to be slave labor. Humans revolted, overthrew the aliens, and reversed the roles by making the aliens second class citizens. Presumably, the initial population was several hundred people to several thousand people, but probably did not exceed the roughly 6000 people currently alive in the episode.<!

Based on what we see in the episode, a wide variety of skills and knowledge was present in this initial population. Certainly enough to allow the humans to recreate their way of life on an alien planet. The initial population might even have been abducted from an entire frontier settler town in which those skills and knowledge bases were present. But 200 years later, the culture should have diverged by taking into account local flora and fauna (like sun vipers).

But we don't see that. We see a static culture that hasn't changed in 200 years. A culture in which even fashion choices regarding color, dress length, or coat lapel style hasn't changed which simply does not happen with real world cultures and histories. There isn't even any ingenuity in the architecture.

Now, cultural rules may strongly pressure people to maintain tradition when it comes to making goods or building new structures. The Amish are a good example of this. But even the Amish have changed over the last 100+ years with some groups making use of pneumatic tools. And that can certainly be attributed to outside pressure of American culture that surrounds them. But given that there are several settlements in "North Star" that are not close together, that should have been enough for the local human culture to start diverging. But we don't see that. And we never have in these kinds of episodes in Star Trek.

And I can't even begin to get started on the linguistics aspect, but that's because I am no linguist.

Also, Stargate SG-1 is even more guilty of this.

Anyway, thanks for listening to my rant. Really wish more anthropologists were consulted in television and film.

Edit: Also, definitely a racism undercurrent. How dare aliens enslave white people?! And that somehow 19th century white people are so great that they can overthrow aliens that transported them light years away. But there's no comment on Earth's own dark history of human enslavement.

I heard that there are wild raspberries in the Hills, but I haven't gone in the few years I have lived here. I wanted to make a point of trying to go picking this year, but I've been busy with work. I tried searching on the net for information, but I was coming up short. Did I miss raspberry season? And if not, where would you recommend I go looking?

I heard that there are wild raspberries in the Hills, but I haven't gone in the few years I have lived here. I wanted to make a point of trying to go picking this year, but I've been busy with work. I tried searching on the net for information, but I was coming up short. Did I miss raspberry season? And if not, where would you recommend I go looking?