Stowaway's guide to the Pacific

"A stowaway's guide to the Pacific" is an exploration of some of the great voyages of history, presented as an interactive documentary drama. Written and designed for children aged between 8 and 12 years old, the project has cleverly utilised the online environment to enable young audiences to engage with not only the drama's characters and their journey, but the various historical times to which they are transported.

To boldly go where no one has gone before: symbolic annihilation and queer interventions in the Star Trek universe

Despite queer readings and interpretations by scholars and fans alike, the official Star Trek universe is devoid of any concrete or obvious representation of LGBTIQ identities. While this appears to be a case of symbolic annihilation, two recent episodes of the Internet series Star Trek New Voyages: Phase II (2004–, webseries), titled ‘Blood and Fire: Part One’ and ‘Blood and Fire: Part Two’, finally go where official Star Trek texts could, or would, not. Taking up the dual perspective of both fan and scholar, in this article I argue that these episodes use the conspicuous absence of representations of sexual diversity in the Star Trek franchise proper as the impetus for a creative intervention, one that embodies the capacity of science fiction texts to explore human sexuality beyond the confines of heteronormative identities.