Issue Contents

• President’s Letter
• Senior Editor’s Note
• Editor Highlights
• Exploring the Worlds of Star Trek: Where Anthropology Has Gone Before
• Notes on the Corpse Forests of the Crystal Coast
• Repurposed Churches and the Ghosts of Social Infrastructure in Quebec
• NAPA Contributes to Online Education Resource for Anthropology Students
• Organizational Relations Committee (ORC) Update
• Call for Volunteers – Social Media Mavens
• General Call for Volunteers and Publications

President’s letter

Dear NAPA Members, 

We are just weeks away from the AAA Annual Meeting, and I look forward to seeing many of you in New Orleans this November. The fall conference will be an opportunity for us to reconnect and renew professional ties at a time that often feels overwhelming. Many of us are seeking relief (refuge?) from the headlines, balancing work disruptions and personal struggles, and attending to the needs of family, health, and daily living. 

For me, the changes coming out of Washington, D.C., are remarkably personal. I am a Washingtonian by birth, raised in and around the District during the Reagan-Bush-Clinton years, and I return frequently to see family and friends. At the moment, I have a new connection; my oldest daughter is spending a semester in D.C. to intern at two federal agencies as she prepares for a finance career in the global energy industry. 

Honestly, dropping her at the dorm near DuPont Circle was a shock to my system. I am getting better at the college goodbyes, but this one was wholly different. The monuments and museums of my youth were not buzzing with visitors; instead replaced by patrols and checkpoints in the middle of August. She’s a junior at UC Berkeley and wears her Cal affiliation with pride. But I was nervous to leave her in a place that felt so suddenly unwelcoming and unlike my childhood home. She reassured me.  

“Don’t worry, Mom. I’m going to use my anthropology to get through.”

You can imagine the smile on my face. She’s an economics major, but it sounded like a little of my world had left an impression. What she described was akin to being a participant-observer in these spaces. She knew to learn the language and watch for the social boundaries. She was ready to look for and question the structures, networks, and social silences, grounded in the need to see the inner workings. She planned to witness it and report back, using first-hand knowledge to make positive impacts in her future work. 

It occurred to me that we can all use our anthropology during this period of intense change. As professional, practicing, and applied anthropologists, we share a skill set that allows us to take in cultural information, analyze it, and share it. Or, in this moment, we can also use our talents to navigate the uncertainties and support our networks. 

To that end, I urge you to keep choosing NAPA as your professional home. Our upcoming fall events at the AAA Annual Meeting are there to reinforce and expand our connections to one another. If you find yourself renewing your AAA membership – or if you are in a position to influence colleagues and students to join – be sure to click on NAPA as your section choice. We are one of the few growing sections within AAA at the moment, with some excellent member opportunities in development. Become a sustaining member if you can and give a little more “oompf” to your support of NAPA. 

Next, I invite you to join me in New Orleans at the NAPA Careers Expo on Friday, November 21 – now 20 years strong! Soon, NAPA will be sharing information about our upcoming annual business meeting, topical sessions, and sponsored workshops in addition to the Expo during conference week. Can’t wait to chat with you there.

If New Orleans is not in the cards, take the time for a little productive disruption and enjoy the ongoing SNAPAshots video series. Be on the lookout for new offerings from the Professional Development committee to level up your skills and connections. You will also find me with colleagues Matt Artz and Jennifer Collier Jennings on an AAA webinar set for October 17 on the topic of publishing. Stay tuned for NAPA and AAA alerts on those events. 

Finally, remember to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month through October 15 with family and colleagues. This is a wonderful opportunity to recognize significant individuals, historic moments, and singular contributions to American life.  

As always, I am available by email at suanna@myheadfort.com or find me on LinkedIn at in/suannaselbycrowley to get acquainted. 

Wishing you health and success this fall. 

Yours sincerely, 

Suanna Selby Crowley

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Contributions

Senior Editor’s Note

Author: Joshua Liggett, MS, LSSBB, CPHQ
NAPA Communications Committee Co-Chair

Dear readers,

We’re leaning into a couple of themes for this issue, the upcoming AAA Annual Meeting theme of Ghosts and a personal favorite day in September, Star Trek Day. As we navigate changes in our personal and professional lives, the stories that Star Trek series’ tell and the ethics lessons they teach give me hope for our future and the world we leave for our own next generations even as we contend with the transitions around us, be it climate change or in our social infrastructure. Please enjoy the articles written by our editorial team and the section and committee updates included in this issue. If you’d like to join us in our work on the NAPA Notes team, Comms, or another NAPA Committee altogether, please fill out our general volunteer application!

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Editor Highlight

Author: Sam Victor, PhD
NAPA Notes Editor, NAPA Communications Committee

I’m a cultural anthropologist focused on pluralism, value conflict, and contemporary religious life. Through my work, I seek to clarify how people navigate competing ethical and institutional commitments in pursuit of a good life. While I am originally from the US, I’ve lived in Quebec (Canada) for much of my adult life. My cross-border experience sparked a fascination with the sometimes jarring differences between how people on their side understand religion’s role in public life.

I studied languages as an undergraduate before turning to anthropology during my master’s at Université de Montréal. My early research was a deep dive into ethical dilemmas experienced by white evangelicals in the American Bible Belt who engaged in anti-Islamophobia activism during the first Trump administration. This opened a broader inquiry into how members of dominant groups renegotiate moral obligations in polarized times. My PhD at the University of Cambridge refined this focus, based on nearly two years of fieldwork with a Tennessee church moving away from fundamentalist doctrines. This research, which I am currently developing into a book, offers a vivid ethnographic account of a community grappling with inherited values as they rework their own standards of moral credibility.

Today, I’m increasingly oriented toward applied research. As a Postdoctoral Fellow at McGill University, I’m working with Hillary Kaell on an ethnographic project about the repurposing of defunct churches, which explores how moral, political, and economic values intersect in citizens’ efforts to transform Montreal’s built religious heritage into pluralistic community spaces. I’m excited to be part of the many anthropologists demonstrating what our discipline can do beyond the academy, especially in building more inclusive communities and shaping public policy.

If you’re interested, you can check out my work here. I’d love to get in touch.

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Exploring the Worlds of Star Trek: Where Anthropology Has Gone Before

Author: Jacqueline Woodruff, MA, CCRA, PMP
NAPA Notes Editor, NAPA Communications Committee

 “Star Trek Day” celebrates the September 8,1966 NBC premiere of Star Trek (The Original Series, known also by Trekkies and fans as TOS).  The Star Trek (ST) series and subsequent spin-offs have been exciting generations of audiences for almost 60 years. Although not a Trekkie per se, I very much enjoy these shows and anticipate the start of new seasons. 

Perhaps you are a fan of the original series (Star Trek: TOS), or Enterprise (ENT), or Discovery Seasons 1 and 2 (DSC), or Strange New Worlds (SNW), which preceded TOS in stardate time. Perhaps as a kid, you watched “Star Trek: The Animated Series” (TAS) or a newer incarnation like the TV-14 Lower Decks or the Y-7 Prodigy.  You may be a fan of the many ST films, books, and comics, or attend conventions. For your reference, I have put the following series in the order of stardate time periods, beginning with Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG), one hundred years after TOS, then Deep Space Nine (DS9), Voyager (VOY), Lower Decks (LD), Prodigy (PRO), Picard (PIC), and Discovery Season 3 (furthest into the future, the 32^nd century (Milburn 2021)). Each series has a distinct culture, recognizable characters, roles, technology, time frame, and storyline connecting it to the original series or acceptance into the Star Trek canon (or not – there are active debates on these aspects of the shows).  

Star Trek has been used to lure curious students into anthropology classrooms, encourage deeper thought among earthly human inhabitants about our circumstances, and prompt new ways to solve problems, human, non-human, social, environmental, and extraterrestrial, that perplex and persist among us. The stories Star Trek presents are very much human stories, whether dealing with a human member of a starship crew or a 23^rd century Klingon.

In this article, I consider a few of the connections between Star Trek as a genre and the many facets of anthropology. Cultural anthropology is easy to recognize, but there are also linguistics, biological anthropology, and archeology embedded in the storytelling.

Star Trek and the anthropology connection: 

Star Trek embraces the foundations of anthropology, whether intentionally or not. There are so many theories and concepts at play. Which is why goo gobs of courses are taught on Star Trek and the social sciences, including anthropology.  Following are some of the anthropological concepts and theory areas seen in the Star Trek universe: Insights into general culture and societies (the Federation, Starfleet, planets, ship, crew, crew vs leadership), archeology, evolution, adaptation, survival of the fittest, cultural relativism, colonialism, world building, social theory, communication, language, power, identity, gender, sexuality, agency, subjectivity, “alien” theories, front stage / back stage theories, and material culture, to name a few.

Before Star Trek crew set off from Starfleet headquarters on their journey, they are equipped with a few standard items (their material culture): a communicator, a phaser, and a uniform indicating rank, area, and in the TOS episodes gender and sexuality. They are also taught to uphold the “do no harm” principle, known as “the Prime Directive”, which states, that “Starfleet personnel will under no circumstances interfere with the natural development of alien civilizations, even if they are well-intentioned” (Paramount Plus 2025).  Fans and critics alike question how hard they actually try because they often fail to follow it. However, that is what leads to exciting adventures. 

Often on “away-missions”, a person who is familiar with the destination, culture, inhabitants, such as an anthropologist, linguist, or expert communicator, is included as a team member. We see characters apply the anthropological tools of observation, listening, acquiring data, and analysis. A major prop in Star Trek (particularly TOS) is the Captain’s Log, recording the mission and observations. 

In the real world, anthropologists are observing the Star Trek universe. Started in 2014, “The Geek Anthropologist”, an anthropology blog, writes a series entitled “Anthropology in Outerspace” (The Geek Anthropologist 2014). One article in the series, by Kirkland and Rivers, analyzed the anthropological process of Star Trek Discovery’s Captain Michael Burnham, a “xenoanthropologist”, over the show’s 5 seasons (Kirkland and Rivers 2018). Other anthropologists include Lieutenant Nyota Uhura (Communications Officer and Xenolinguistics specialist, TOS), Captain Jean-Luc Picard (archaeology, TNG), and Commander Chakotay (degreed Anthropologist, VOY). 

Ultimately, in Star Trek scenarios, technology often emerges as the primary solution. It is backed by consideration of the culture, philosophy, politics, and doing some good old ethnographic field work (participant observation) with the “alien” species or “foreign” culture. Typically, the time frame of an hour episode, does not allow for “deep hanging out” (Geertz 1998) with new species, except for Deep Space Nine, where their space station is the meeting place. 

Communication and linguistics are key to the Star Trek universe.  From “live long and prosper” (words and hand sign) to “resistance is futile”, it is hard to escape the language the Star Trek world has created in the public mind. Having its own language, with dialects found within each series, creates shared kinship between each show and their fandom. There exists a plethora of abbreviations, terms, definitions, names, and more to describe and live within the worlds created by the writers, physical and digital special effects teams, costume designers, creators of the accoutrements, and other folks, including continuity consultants. Just dare to pretend to speak Vulcan at a Star Trek convention! However, you are not without help. Did you know a Google search with the AI overview, at the time of this writing, could provide Vulcan formatting and greetings, in both English and Vulcan? Perhaps this is our version of the Star Trek “Universal Translator” (TOS).  Star Trek tackles the complexities of communication – how well beings communicate, modes of communication (voice, sound, mental, emotional, physical, movement, and even chemical). Survival often hinges on successful interactions from the perspective of the “speaker”, the listener, or observer. For example, communication between Discovery crew and Species 10-C seemed questionable until determining the 10-C’s mode of communication was through “emitting emotion-conveying hydrocarbons and flashing lights” (Memory Alpha 2025c) Star Trek also has a strong linguistic bend and frequently relies on the Universal Translator or the Linguacode to facilitate a level of understanding. Linguacode is a “translation matrix” upon which the UT was built in the 22^nd century (stardate time), created by Ensign Hoshi Sato (like Uhura, also a linguist and communications officer) (Memory Alpha 2025b). Expecting “alien” languages to have little in common, it proved to be a remarkable resource.

Cultural anthropology: 

Star Trek gets us thinking about culture.  Appearing as humans, humanoids (e.g., Vulcans, Klingons, and Romulans), and non-humanoids (e.g., the Gorn and Tribbles), the visible and the invisible, each ST series creates scenarios of familiar and unfamiliar actors working through circumstances we Earthlings can relate to. In a more recent series, SNW (2022 to present), there is a Vulcan (young Spock) who is an avid researcher of human culture, which subverts our own perceptions on end, as he takes the commonplace and presents it as exotic to emotionally suppressed species. Further, in the same series, there is a long-lived Lanthanite (Pelia) that is presented as a participant-observer for the entirety of human civilization.  

Kinship and ancestry are major themes in Star Trek. The Klingons, Vulcans, the Borg, and even the Federation are great examples. For the Borg, the ultimate kinship is assimilation, the loss of individual identity in favor of “the collective”, of shared thoughts and unified actions. Ferengi males present the opposite, as extreme individualists and being extraordinarily adept at negotiation to make a profit. Misogynistic, Ferengi society once held strict gender roles subjugating women, which changed following the women’s movement in the 24^th century (Memory Alpha 2025a). These examples show similarities in social struggles within our world and Star Trek worlds.

Also in the real world, there is a kinship that exists among all Star Trek participants in a series or film, be they actors, writers, production crew, or others. Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher on TNG), on “the Ready Room”, is committed to maintaining a place for cast and crew and others in the Star Trek production world to come and share experiences, providing a visible space where cast will always be members of the Star Trek family.

In anthropology, we study organizations. Each Star Trek ship or Starbase or planetary base, is certainly an organization, with its lead officers and crew. The series often explore topics about collaboration, team culture, decision making, sometimes in conflict with institutions of power, like Starfleet or the Federation or the “Prime Directive”.

Who is the organization willing to sacrifice in order to save the many? Notably, the “redshirts”, have become humorously infamous as the first to die in conflict or misunderstandings or ship turmoil, particularly in TOS crew. Playfully, a new comic series by Christopher Cantwell and illustrated by Megan Levens, was issued in July 2025. Cantwell said, “We will get to know these Ensigns and Lieutenants intimately before they are likewise crushed, disrupter’d, and sucked into space. Who will survive? Will any?” (StarTrek.com Staff 2025) The Star Trek series, “Lower Decks” (IMDb 2025b), also presents a lighter look at those in the lower ranks and their experiences. 

However, Star Trek often has a dark side, as seen in recent SNW episodes dealing with the Gorn. Faced with pure survival, Starfleet crew must make swift decisions about who lives and who dies, them or us. Reimagined for SNW, the Giger-esque (“Alien” franchise) monster images (Geek 2024) and fast action push these episodes into the horror genre. There are interesting analyses of what the Gorn could represent beyond easy antagonists for the ST storyline.  Some suggest they prompt us to again reflect on deep failures in communication, intolerance of other cultures, or as metaphor for societal “anxiety and uncertainty” (Memory Alpha 2025a; Mooney 2023b). Recent SNW episodes add further complexity to the interactions between the Starfleet and the Gorn, beyond being disparate cultures in conflict.

You may recall the Vulcan “axiom”, spoken by several, but made memorable by Spock in his death scene with Kirk in the movie ST II: “The Wrath of Khan”, “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one” (John DiMarco 2024).  That cultural tenet in ST is a repeated principle across the series. Observing how it is applied is core to understanding ethical, cultural, and kinship choices made as challenges arise during new or “alien” encounters, and impacts the command, “phasers set on stun” or “to maximum.”  Not surprisingly, if we follow previously violent or ruthless characters (e.g., Klingons, Romulans, and Ferengi) along the Star Trek timeline, we see them adapting to Federation culture to satisfy their needs for power and influence.

Biological anthropology: 

Differences in biological development, reproduction, physical appearance, and evolution frequently emerge as themes. In Star Trek TV shows and movies, we see characters physically change over time in response to adaptations to environments or as needed for survival. Consider the hyper reproduction cycle of the Tribbles, which in a new predator-free environment, resulted in spontaneous little fur balls popping out freely and landing everywhere (IMDb 2025a). 

Unexplained character morphing, such as changes to the Klingons’ appearance over the years, remain irritating for some fans. The writers attempted to wipe it away during a bar scene, when Worf is sitting with his confused crew mates looking at several very human-looking Klingons in the bar. O’Brien asks if it is due to “some kind of genetic engineering” and Bashir suggests “a viral mutation”.  Worf reluctantly responds, “They are Klingons, and it’s a long story. We do not discuss it with outsiders.” (DS 9, S5E06 – “Trials and Tribble-ations” (Vladimir 2011)), indicating his own discomfort identifying with these Klingons and with what led to this physical evolution.

Speaking of survival, following the 1^st pilot episode (there were two), Roddenberry was required to change Spock’s features to be less satanic and to eliminate the female second in command, “Number One”. To save the show, he gave in and eliminated the female Number One and modified Spock’s appearance.

There are lots of reviews of Star Trek inspired instruments and gadgetry that can be seen in our current world. I recently heard from my husband the story of a sighting of Leonard Nimoy talking on his flip phone, and people saying, “Oooh, there’s Spock talking on his communicator”. I will not say much more about those things here. However, one item we might hope for is the medical tricorder. Medical scanners exist, but developers still aspire to deliver the ideal tricorder (named for three properties: sensing, recording, and computing (Cowing 2023)). Researchers, including those at the University of North Dakota, want to provide such a non-invasive healthcare device to patients at home to reduce “frequent hospital visits [and for those who] lack easy access to a healthcare facility” (Kurtz 2024).  Even more desirable would be an Emergency Medical Hologram (EMH) as in VOY, which can be a sentient, compassionate, holographic doctor that appears when needed to assess and treat patients wherever they are.

In the Star Trek universe, injuries and illnesses are unavoidable and situations prompt questions when considering the health of the crew or encountered beings. Questions include:  What is Star Trek’s approach or perspective on health equity – is there equal care for all species? There are several episodes in various series where different species create a health challenge. How does Star Trek handle the topic of taking care of varied species?  What principles are foundational to treating the ill, especially other species?  

A difficult choice in prioritizing life is the story of Neelix (Talaxian species and an endeared member of the Voyager team). In VOY: “The Phage”, the Vidiians stole Neelix’s lungs to replace their own failing body parts. Captain Janeway found a way to satisfy both species’ needs, by finding a volunteer lung donor for Neelix and recognizing that the Vidiians’ actions were for their own survival (Memory Alpha 2025c).

Star Trek has delved into mental health and impacts on the individual, the crew, and the mission. For example, on Discovery, the story followed the crew’s doctor, Hugh Culber, while suffering from depression and shifts in self-identity after a traumatic resurrection and rebirth, resulting in deeper insights into his relationships with crew and patients (Grech 2020; Gumeny 2022; Memory Alpha 2025b). TNG and DS9, both also pursued these themes. TNG through an embedded counselor, Deanna Troi, an empathic Betazoid, who served the Enterprise crew and struggled through losing and regaining her own abilities. In DS9, Ezri Dax, the ninth host to a Trill symbiont, served the DS9 crew and supported the crew through anxieties about conflicting identities and through war trauma.

Archaeology (and Material Culture): 

Archaeology plays a role in many Star Trek episodes.  We have seen crews examining human remains following an attack or finding a destroyed ship. There is a good bit of trauma (Oops, I mean drama) on Star Trek.

Landing onto a planet’s surface and observing and evaluating a situation based on who or what is there (or not), assessing the remnants (human, fossil, an essence of life, planets, ships, and all things left behind) or in use. Through forensics, biological, biochemical, DNA, GIS, and other scientific and cultural methods and tools the Star Trek crew can reveal and record evidence of how cultures and societies lived or now live. Do we feel safe? Do we need special medical gear or protection from the environment?  As Mary Douglas might prompt, do we sense danger? Or, do we feel a connection? The insights and tools of archeology and related sciences often frame the scenario and define next steps for how to proceed into an unfamiliar place. In TNG, Picard has a number of arcs that activate his Archaeological training, working directly with his mentor or a colleague that wends closer to treasure-hunter, including delving into the more unified origins of life in the “Alpha Quadrant” of our galaxy.

Hinting at what for some can be the dark side of archaeology, grave robbing, obsession, and fighting the desire to remove relics better left in place. In SNW season 3, we are introduced to Roger Korby, researcher in archaeological medicine, who becomes as some of you may know as the android protagonist in TOS episode “What are Little Girls Made Of?”.  However, on the way to that future, in “Through the Lens of Time” (SNW), Korby employs 23^rd century excavation tools to instantly reveal an ancient site.  For me, the “dig” is a bit too easy and leaves little surrounding context, but moves us into the site faster, where the next adventure plays out.

Storytelling and Anthropology: 

Storytelling in the Star Trek universe often brings in anthropological concepts. So much so, that I wonder about intentionality. Is the writers’ use of anthropological concepts just a natural default for how we tell our stories (even as aliens)?  These stories are written by people, in our world – about human drama (or about “aliens” attributed with human qualities), situations, current social issues in disguise, which inherently engage anthropological principles. Star Trek stories are asking questions, raising issues, and posing multiple solutions to problems that anthropology is helping to address. 

Using anthropology we can analyze the storytelling. There are Front stage actors (On-screen contributors – e.g., actors, stunt people, special effects, vessels, technology, and similar), Back stage actors (Off-screen folks – e.g., writers, directors, stunt coordinators, and similar), “Hybrid” actors (connecting on-and off-screen participants – e.g., Special effects creators, wardrobe, makeup, etc…).  All these things pull the story together, bring it to life, and create a universe.

There is a huge Star Trek fan base, including anthropologists, who examine, analyze, and comment on all that is Star Trek, recording and contributing to its legacy. Their work enriches the context, history, and connectivity between series, enabling a much fuller view of that universe. There is so much more to be explored within and alongside the many worlds of the fans and the fandom.  I am grateful to the fans, fandoms, my hubby, and co-editors who added richness to this article.

Star Trek has influenced our lives, proposed visions of the future, and challenges us to look through the lens of another species or planetary culture so we may reflect on our own present circumstances, current events, and cultural shifts, even as our cultures evolve over time.  

I often tell people “anthropology is everywhere”! Certainly, it is everywhere you look in Star Trek!

What are your favorite “Star Trek and anthropology” connections?

Bibliography

Cowing, Keith. 2023. “Tricorder Tech: That Star Trek Medical Scanner Is Getting Much Closer.” Astrobiology, November 27. https://astrobiology.com/2023/11/tricorder-tech-that-star-trek-medical-scanner-is-getting-much-closer.html.

Geek, A. Middle Aged. 2024. “The Gorn Identity: Star Trek’s Revision of an Iconic Alien Species….” Musings of a Middle-Aged Geek, June 14. https://musingsofamiddleagedgeek.blog/2024/06/13/the-gorn-identity-star-treks-revision-of-an-iconic-alien-species/.

Geertz, Clifford. 1998. Review of Deep Hanging Out, by Pierre Clastres and Clifford James. The New York Review of Books, October 22. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1998/10/22/deep-hanging-out/.

Grech, Victor. 2020. “Doctors in Star Trek: Hugh Culber in Star Trek: Discovery.” Early Human Development 144 (May): 104995. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earlhumdev.2020.104995.

Gumeny, Eirik. 2022. “STAR TREK: DISCOVERY Understands the Trauma of Life After Death.” Nerdist, March 8. https://nerdist.com/article/star-trek-discovery-hugh-culber-life-after-death-wilson-cruz/.

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John DiMarco, dir. 2024. Thursday Trek: The Needs of the Many. 1:51. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1u0S56oRR8.

Kirkland, Logan A, and Joshua W Rivers. 2018. “The Celestial Ethnographers: Imagining the Future of Anthropology in Star Trek Discovery.” The Geek Anthropologist, August 24. https://thegeekanthropologist.com/2018/08/24/the-celestial-ethnographers-imagining-the-future-of-anthropology-in-star-trek-discovery/.

Kurtz, Adam. 2024. “Live Long and Prosper: Star Trek-Inspired Medical Devices on Agenda at UND.” UND Today, October 1. https://blogs.und.edu/und-today/2024/10/c2ship-annual-meeting-brings-future-medical-technology-research-to-und/.

Memory Alpha. 2025a. “Gorn.” September 10. https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Gorn.

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Memory Alpha. 2025c. “Neelix.” Memory Alpha, September 12. https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Neelix.

Milburn, David. 2021. “Discovering The 32nd Century: Discovery Season 3 Review – Trek Central.” Trek Central, January 15. https://trekcentral.net/discovering-the-32nd-century-a-look-back-on-discovery-season-3/.

Mooney, Darren. 2023a. “Strange New Worlds ‘Subspace Rhapsody’ Review: So-so Musical.” The Escapist, August 29. https://www.escapistmagazine.com/star-trek-strange-new-worlds-season-2-episode-9-subspace-rhapsody/.

Mooney, Darren. 2023b. “What Do the Gorn Represent on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds?” The Escapist, August 19. https://www.escapistmagazine.com/what-do-the-gorn-represent-on-star-trek-strange-new-worlds/.

Paramount Plus. 2025. “50 Terms You Know Because Of Star Trek.” Paramount Plus, September 12. https://www.paramountplus.com/shows/star-trek-discovery/photos/1006913/50-terms-you-know-because-of-star-trek/12/.

Pedersen, Amanda. 2023. “We Could All Live Long and Prosper If This ‘Star Trek’ Device Were Real / The Case of the Highly Illogical ‘Star Trek’ Medical Device.” MD+DI: Medical Device and Diagnostic Industry, July 31. https://www.mddionline.com/design-engineering/we-could-all-live-long-and-prosper-if-this-star-trek-device-were-real.

Perry, Alex. 2023. “STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLD Review — ‘Subspace Rhapsody.’” TrekCore.Com, August 3. https://blog.trekcore.com/2023/08/star-trek-strange-new-world-review-subspace-rhapsody/.

StarTrek.com Staff. 2025. “Meet the Characters from New ‘Star Trek: Red Shirts’ Series.” Startrek, March 17. https://www.StarTrek.com/gallery/star-trek-red-shirts-comic-characters.

The Geek Anthropologist. 2014. “Anthropology in Outerspace.” The Geek Anthropologist, August 19. https://thegeekanthropologist.com/anthropology-in-outerspace/.Vladimir, dir. 2011. They Are Klingons… 0:47. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xka6IYCpj4E.

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Notes on the Corpse Forests of the Crystal Coast

Author: Phillip Strickland, MA, PhD
NAPA Notes Editor, NAPA Communications Committee

“Corpse Forest.” Art by Starly Belle. 

As someone with a general fascination towards the spectral and metaphysical; the ethereal and the weird—both in the arts and in academia—the theme of the American Anthropological Association’s 2025 Annual Meeting, Ghosts, piqued my interest. And yet, the word “ghosts,” for me, instills a sense of disarmed melancholy which we, as practicing and applied anthropologists, can ill afford. In the current sociopolitical moment—beset with existential crises, economic tension, and ethical dilemmas—it is preferable to exercise vigilance, circumspection, and reflexivity. And we must always understand that there are no ghosts without corpses. I recall a frank (but cordial) conversation I had with one attendee last year.

“Wow, Ghosts?” I said, eyes rolling, “I can’t wait to see 200 panels about hauntology.”

In retrospect, this was a rather cynical take on my part; not exactly in the spirit of interdisciplinarity. At the time, I was more interested in developing a career based on collaboration with professionals who have no idea what “hauntology” even is. Essentially, I was imagining myself trying to explain to a transportation planner that they can’t put a bus stop across the street from a haunted house, because there are ghosts there. That sort of thing. Even so, I can appreciate those “ghosts” which aren’t really ghosts—but are colloquially or theoretically referred to as such by scientists because the metaphor can elicit affective interest and effective engagement. In any case, if presented with the option of talking about “real ghosts” vs. theoretical abstractions which we have dubbed “ghosts,” I’ve always been more interested in the former.

Barring ghosts, we can talk about the bodies animated by them. One could make the case that, for all the ghosts we’re haunted by, each and every ghost is embodied and, therefore, “real”—or, at least, about as real as those other abstractions with which we are intimately conversant as human beings: the ghosts of gender, nationality, kinship; those ghosts which flit about in the grass, the water, and the sky, giving testimonies of homo sapiens and our handiwork over thousands of years—and all the traces we’ve yet to leave behind. All of them have their stories. Maybe all stories are ghost stories, after all (Wolfreys 2002, 3).

In December, I started thinking about what “ghost story” I wanted to tell. Earlier that year, I had completed my practicum, where I studied perceptions of the urban tree canopy in Charlotte, North Carolina. As such, I was still fixated on all things arboreal. My mind eventually meandered into the topic of anthropogenic climate change; the multispecies mortality it invariably exacerbates. Near my childhood home in Carteret County, there is much deliberation on the topic of environmental quality among scientists and those who fish as a means of subsistence and/or recreation. And it was there, on the bridges of Eastern North Carolina, where I decided which “ghosts” I should talk about; subjects of dread which make my occasional rides between the Piedmont and the Tidewater—what should be a heartwarming return to my hometown—more pensive and bleaker. Without fail, a whispering chorus of ghastly forms always breathes down my neck, and I can’t help but wince. This is the wan welcoming committee of gangling “ghosts.” They confirm I am closer to the Crystal Coast.

They are the oft-lamented “ghost forests;” the sentinel toothpicks of North Carolina’s wetlands. Here, an encroaching Atlantic Ocean seeps further and further into the water table, killing trees with a lower tolerance for salt. The trees die en masse, leaving behind the skeletal remnants of their sunbleached branches and trunks (Morrison 2021).

Tree corpses linger on the marsh grass near Pine Knoll Shores, North Carolina. Photograph by Phillip C. Strickland.

As if Eastern North Carolina weren’t already rife with ghosts and legends. As if the Outer Banks weren’t notorious enough for being labeled the “Graveyard of the Atlantic” (Weinberg 2018). Those with some ties to the Tidewater may be aware of the legends associated with pirates and other ne’er-do-wells, namely Blackbeard. Storytellers recount how his headless corpse swam around Robert Maynard’s ship, and how Blackbeard’s ghost searches Pamlico Sound, in vain, for his severed head (Whedbee 2004). Local folklorists, historians, and anthropologists have heard this tale before, and they still pass it down to those who are willing to listen. I grew up hearing these stories, visiting the Old Burying Ground in Beaufort, hearing tell of the Queen Anne’s Revenge, its watery remnants in Beaufort Inlet, and the fascinating insights of maritime archaeologists (Wilde-Ramsing 2007).

It is worth mentioning that the so-called “Golden Age of Piracy” occurred in the context of rampant, rapacious, and racializing colonialism (Mackie 2005, 28-29). Before European pirates set foot on the sand, the islands, pocosins, estuaries, and longleaf pine forests of the Coastal Plain were already inhabited by speakers of Algonquian, Iroquoian, and Siouan languages. Many geographic areas along the coast are still invoked in the tongues of local Indigenous peoples—Pamlico, Neuse, Mattamuskeet, Chowan, and many others (Griffith 1999, 19). These territories were systematically charted, carved, and stripped for industry (Burke 2021, 9). The ditches and canals dug over a century ago facilitated the saltwater intrusion we see today and, by extension, the deaths of hundreds of trees. This anthropogenic geomorphology necessitated for this extraction—all indelibly linked to the torture and exploitation of enslaved peoples—renders the character of the “ghost forest” in stripes of oppression and subjugation. As Burke (2021) remarks: “The scars on the landscape are bodily scars. The geology of the ghost forest is a racialized geology.” (9).

It seems to me, then, that the issue of “ghost forests” is rather more visceral than ethereal; a profound ecological signifier of challenges to come, and evidence of injustices from a not-too-distant past. Perhaps we should start calling them “corpse forests,” so as to acknowledge a very real, bloody, and dire actuality of anthropogenic climate change. It’s too easy to call them “ghost forests” because the dead trees look like ghosts. The corpse forests may, themselves, be haunting. But the real ghosts emanating from these corpse forests, I contend, are largely mythic in nature. Moreover, they derive from pantemporal subjective experiences (Rahimi 2016). Their very presence speaks to legacies of wanton disregard for human rights and local ecosystems, even as they stand as harbingers of anthropogenic climate change (McDermott 2023). There is more than one ghost in a corpse forest: one of an ecosystem’s past, and those of its possible futures.

There will always be ghosts, spirits, specters, phantoms, and poltergeists; just as there will always be those who don’t believe in them. It’s tougher, however, to ignore the corpses rotting in your own backyard.

Bibliography

Burke, Kevin. 2021. “Transecting Ghost Forests.” Anthropology News, October.

Griffith, David. 1999. The Estuary’s Gift: An Atlantic Coast Cultural Biography. Rural Studies Series. Pennsylvania State Univ. Press.

Mackie, Erin. 2005. “Welcome the Outlaw: Pirates, Maroons, and Caribbean Countercultures.” Cultural Critique, (59): 24–62. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4489197.

McDermott, Amy. 2023. “Ghost Forests Haunt the East Coast, Harbingers of Sea-Level Rise.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 120 (38): e2314607120. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2314607120.

Morrison, Jim. 2021. “Why Ecologists Are Haunted by the Rapid Growth of Ghost Forests.” Smithsonian Magazine, May 17. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/why-ecologists-are-haunted-rapid-growth-ghost-forests-180977674/.

N.C. Forest Service. 2024. “Coastal Ghost Forests: The Silent Sentinels of Sea Level Rise | In the Field.” In the Field, October 1. https://blog.ncagr.gov/2024/10/01/coastal-ghost-forests-the-silent-sentinels-of-sea-level-rise/.

Rahimi, Sadeq. 2016. “Haunted Metaphor, Transmitted Affect: The Pantemporality of Subjective Experience.” Subjectivity 9 (1): 83–105. https://doi.org/10.1057/sub.2015.21.

Weinberg, Elizabeth. 2018. “Maritime Archaeologists Document Historic Graveyard of the Atlantic Shipwrecks.” November. https://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/news/nov18/maritime-archaeologists-document-history-graveyard-of-the-atlantic-shipwrecks.html.

Whedbee, Charles Harry. 2004. “The Pirate Lights of Pamlico Sound.” In Pirates, Ghosts, and Coastal Lore: The Best of Judge Whedbee. John F. Blair.

Wilde-Ramsing, Mark U. 2007. “The Pirate Ship Queen Anne’s Revenge.” In X Marks the Spot: The Archaeology of Piracy, 1. paperback ed. New Perspectives on Maritime History and Nautical Archaeology. University Press of Florida.
Wolfreys, Julian. 2002. Victorian Hauntings: Spectrality, Gothic, the Uncanny, and Literature. Palgrave.

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Repurposed Churches and the Ghosts of Social Infrastructure in Quebec

Author: Sam Victor, PhD
NAPA Notes Editor, NAPA Communications Committee

The upcoming AAA Annual Meeting has me thinking about “ghosts” and where they might be lurking in my own field sites. Since the mid-twentieth century, church attendance across the global North has plummeted, forcing legacy religious institutions to divest from buildings they can no longer afford. In Quebec, lack of a coherent safeguarding strategy from either local dioceses or the government has accelerated conversions of historic churches into for-profit ventures like condos, gyms, and even nightclubs. This has prompted public outcry over the loss of a collective inheritance built through generations of tithing and volunteerism. In response to privatization, grassroots coalitions are experimenting with new social economy strategies to repurpose struggling church buildings into community-serving assets. Historically, the Catholic Church stood at the heart of Quebec’s social welfare infrastructure, running hospitals, schools, and charities. Today, however, it has largely been pushed to the margins of such institutions.

This crystallizes broader political tensions around secularization into concrete decisions about authority, access, and responsibility: Who should profit from the sale of heritage buildings: the Catholic Church, private developers, or community land trusts? Should churches retain historic tax privileges or be required to continually prove their social value? Can these sites ever truly become inclusive, public spaces if they remain privately-owned religious properties?

Far from an isolated phenomenon, church adaptation projects form part of a wider ecosystem of collective real estate (immobilier collectif), which seeks to preserve land and buildings for public use amid pressures to privatize; think affordable housing, nonprofit offices, or community centres. In some cases, churches are still owned by the diocese, but nonprofit cooperatives manage the properties. In other cases, buildings are deconsecrated and sold to a municipality, making them officially public sites. Retrofitting these churches, then, is not only material but also political, “unbuilding previous systems of governance, accountability, and infrastructural care” (Şalaru 2025, n.p.).

As an anthropologist, I see the adaptive reuse of defunct churches as an arena of ethical negotiation over the meaning of public good. Many French Canadian-descent Quebecois consider themselves “culturally Catholic.” But their attachments are complicated by a strong commitment to laïcité (state secularism), a principle that continues to stir political debate by tightly regulating religious expression in public institutions, especially for non-Catholic minorities. My latest work explores religion’s fraught institutional legacy in shaping civic values in Quebec. I began exploring this dilemma after Hillary Kaell, an anthropologist at McGill University, invited me to collaborate on an ethnographic deep dive into an at-risk church in Montreal called St Jax Church, originally built in 1864 (Kaell & Victor, forthcoming). The congregation uses its property tax exemption to provide affordable office space to nonprofits that otherwise could not afford downtown prices. For historic churches like St Jax, weathered stone bell towers, solid wooden rafters, and leaking roofs can cost hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars to repair. Weekly attendance is only in the dozens, so warding off profit-seeking developers requires creative—and often controversial—experiments with sacred space, zoning regulations, and commercial activities to raise enough revenue to keep the building open. The sanctuary’s pews have been removed to create a multifunctional gathering space hosting everything from Sunday worship and baptisms to circus performances and corporate cocktail parties. This case offers a glimpse of the uneasy compromises that owners of religious buildings now face, balancing financial survival, civic value, and religious symbolism in the same space.

As I look to other sites where residents are imagining new uses for these old buildings, I trace the ethical labor involved in legitimizing churches as secular social infrastructure, approaching them as civic laboratories. They are inhabited by enduring questions of ownership, memory, and care, entangled in histories of colonialism and nation-building. Today, church properties are becoming a key site for working out dilemmas around land justice, heritage, and belonging. They are sites where citizens negotiate shared futures while contending with the ghosts still dwelling in inherited infrastructure: lingering values, rituals, and hierarchies that resist easy repurposing. Built environments reflect and reshape ethical life, not just through design or symbolism but through the everyday practices of cooperation, contestation, and care that emerge within them. Collective real estate initiatives in Quebec reflect a growing recognition that old religious buildings, once pillars of collective life, can serve as platforms for a new kind of public good for citizens of all faiths or none.

These questions resonate with similar situations in other historically Christian-majority societies, albeit in response to very different political histories and circumstances. In Western Europe, state-led initiatives shape the church property landscape. In the United States, the YIGBY movement (“Yes-in-God’s-backyard”) has emerged to counter NIMBYism (“Not-in-my-backyard”) by advocating the use of religious land for affordable housing. In all cases, such efforts emerge from quandaries of infrastructure imbued with both troubled and cherished memories.

As the way people do religion continues to change, its ghosts live on in debates over the very material legacy of property and land. These are not just questions of zoning or design, they are ethical and political puzzles. How do we live with institutions whose power has waned but whose presence lingers in the built landscape? And how might their transformation open space—literally and symbolically—for building new shared futures?

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NAPA Contributes to Online Education Resource for Anthropology Students

Author: Suanna Selby Crowley, PhD, RPA
NAPA President

Like some of you, I am years past the search for undergraduate or graduate programs in anthropology. But the temptation exists to go back and do it better someday, especially now with the new digital information resources = available to students. 

One such resource is the OnlineU.edu platform. This website curates data, descriptions, reviews, and practical advice on more than 30,000 online degree and certificate programs, allowing students at any stage to search for the best value in online education. 

In June 2025, I sat for an interview with the editors of OnlineU.edu as they revamped their tools for anthropology degrees online. Full disclosure, I did my undergraduate and graduate work fully in-person. But, over the last decade, I have pursued professional certificates and training to expand my knowledge base using only remote learning options. Do I have a favorite? To be honest, no. I am a “both/and” person and find the in-person and remote options equally manageable for consuming educational content. I can’t say the same for building professional networks, as I much prefer “in real life” experiences with colleagues and contacts.

Ahead of the interview, I was asked to review a version of the OnlineU.edu anthropology database. Adopting the perspective of an early career archaeologist looking for remote options to complete a Master’s degree, I surfed through their curated summaries, recommendations (as reported by alumni on the sister GradReports.com website), and metrics on the most popular online programs. 

As a clearinghouse of information, this is a useful resource for a first-pass look at online degree options. Thinking back, I would have welcomed – and mined – such a database for details when I was applying to grad schools. Simple program comparison tools for tuition and post-graduate median salaries as reported by the Department of Education’s College Scorecard (another excellent resource), plus direct links to programs for information requests, make this a site I would bookmark. Certainly, the affordability rankings and submitted student reviews by school are rabbit holes I could easily dive into and augment with other sources of information or personal contacts. 

Downsides to the platform center on a lack of depth overall and a clear sponsorship model that likely allows colleges and universities to boost their profiles. Students will want to do their own legwork on professors, classes, matriculation timelines, fees, and other costs. But for a starting point, I would recommend it. 

As I mentor younger colleagues, I find myself thinking a great deal about job prospects in anthropology and, in particular, my field of specialty: archaeology. That means I frequently look for big picture statistics around employment trends. One source, the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, still has a positive jobs outlook for anthropologists through 2034. Students may want to look at such job forecasts across the sectors and industries where anthropologists work, with an eye toward what additional skills boost their credentialing. Being future-ready as a student anthropologist means developing the hard and soft skills that flex with economic realities or life events. Strong professional networks are key at this early stage and at all career inflection points. 

It may also be worthwhile for students to align multiple passions and be interdisciplinary. The ability to combine anthropology with theories, methods, and experiences learned in another field can make students more valuable and visible to hiring managers. Intentionally and creatively working in multi-disciplinary modes can mean job security and career longevity in hyper-specialized workplaces, or excellent fallback options when life starts to throw curveballs. 

This is true for me as a professional and a parent. I merged archaeology and geosciences at a time when there were relatively few geoarchaeologists working in cultural resources management. For someone with the nickname “Dr. Dirt,” I found I could work anywhere in the world, even at sites with limited material culture. I could also step out and then back into the workforce more successfully when I needed to pay the “mommy tax” or handle unexpected health interruptions. 

To be sure, online degree programs provide students with affordable, efficient ways to complete their education. Whatever virtual, hybrid, or in-person educational path is chosen, students will want to build qualitative and quantitative talents that allow them to grow into their roles, adapt to changes in the workplace, and sustain careers. Data warehouses like OnlineU.edu can provide a useful tool to support that goal. 

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Committee Updates

Organizational Relations Committee (ORC) Update

NAPA Careers Expo

2025 marks the twentieth anniversary of the NAPA Careers Expo.  Over its history the Careers Expo has created a sanctioned space for thousands of students, new professionals, faculty, and anthropologists navigating the path from university experience to the working world.  Hundreds of professional, practicing and applied anthropologists (PPAs) have volunteered their time and resources to participate as Career Guides for the Expo.  Career Guides talk about their careers with participants and outline their career paths and experiences.  Allied Organizations external to the American Anthropological Association (AAA) that focus on our discipline or Sections within AAA also participate to provide assistance to participants navigating   their evolution as anthropologists by sharing information about the opportunities that grow from steps into unknown worlds.  The Expo is the only event where the diversity of our discipline convenes to nurture its own.  

Anthropologists from cutting edge technology firms, AI, cultural resource management, health and human services and international development are some of the Career Guides available for unscripted, personal conversations with participants.  The Expo is a wonderful opportunity to create networks, learn about where our discipline is going and explore brave, new  opportunities that only exist in the imagination.  

The Expo will be on Friday, November 21, Marriott Mardi Gras Ballroom F/G (3rd Floor).  The Expo doors will open at 11 am and close at 4 pm.  NAPA and AAA will be sending out details and reminders through our various social media channels in the coming days.  Please stay tuned and be sure to come by the Expo.

Joshua Liggett and Niel Tashima

Co-chairs, NAPA Organizational Relations Committee 

Call for Volunteers

NAPA Communications – Social Media Mavens

Want to be at the center of the NAPA action? Want to know what we’re doing first and share that with the field? Become part of NAPA’s volunteer information communication hub and promote real world job opportunities and content across NAPA’s social media! Visit our contact portal and inquire today!

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General Call for Volunteers and Publications

Interested in joining our team, but not sure which committee is right for you? Checkout our general volunteer application and one of our coordinators will connect you with the ones that best align with your interests and skill sets!

If you’d like to publish something with NAPA either in NAPA Notes, AnthroNews, or on our website or social media, visit our submission page and let us know.

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