'Explorers' - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

This article examines race in a Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode entitled 'Explorers'. This Star Trek™ spin-off's lead character, named Benjamin Sisko, is of African descent. Sisko must safeguard a fragile peace between Bajorans and Cardassians and secure the commercial and strategic rights to the galaxy's only known stable wormhole, a gateway beyond the Alpha quadrant. In 'Explorers' Sisko tests an 800-year-old legend that Bajorans travelled to Cardassia light years away before either mastered warp technology. Sisko leaves his Starfleet position - command responsibilities and ambassadorial role - builds and pilots his own reproduction of an ancient Bajoran solar ship and, with Jake (his son) replicates the legendary journey. Drawing upon critical theory selected from semiology, film, television, medial critical studies and reception theory, this piece considers how Sisko's character functions and how his identity as an African American facilitates narrative development and the construction of meaning at a non-narrative level.