Shik
Starship database: completed; History of Starfleet: done; website: probably never
Member # 343
posted
Prompted by my bafflement at the massive resurgence of fantasy-related whatever & by the comments in this OHNY post, the question now begs to be asked:
If being a nerd is now cool, then what is now uncool?(other than emo & furries)
I hear people say "Oh, I'm a nerd...I'm a geek" all the time & it's...i don't know. Like, they run full-tilt head-on into things that were once nerdy or geeky but have now so penetrated mainstream society that one can hardly call it nerdy or geeky, can one? The idea was that what made you a nerd was the enjoyment of things that were NOT mainstream, that only squares would be seen doing. But when all the world plays video games & role-playing games, reads J.R.R. Tolkien & Harry Potter, gushes over sci-fi...KNITS, for fuck's sake!...then you're not REALLY a nerd anymore, are you?
I still rep the old-school nerdery. I have books on Star Trek (one of which I'm mentioned in), models of starships, even work on a project to name all the ships in Starfleet. I did a 4th-grade book report on Arthur C. Clarke's 2010: Odyssey Two; everyone else did Beverly Cleary or Judy Blume. I still have my dad's ORIGINAL first-edition AD&D books. And yet.....
I don't dress like a nerd, a hipster, or anyone else; I dress for me. I don't identify with anyone, yet I identify with everyone. And I remember...EVERYTHING.
I call for a new nerdery, a nerdery of unobtrusiveness & ultimate knowledge, & I will blaze the way.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to work on the Odessa-class.
-------------------- "The French have a saying: 'mise en place'—keep everything in its fucking place!"
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted
I have noticed that a lot of topics formerly relegated to the "nerd" category have since become mainstream. But that has occasionally been the case. It can be said that Star Wars is pretty nerdy, but it has enjoyed widespread popularity since its first release.
It often seems like nerdery is a matter of degree rather than topic. If you like Star Wars, you're pretty normal. If you can name the entire Jedi Council, each class of starfighter and capital ship, and more than one style of lightsaber combat, you're a nerd.
There are a few subjects that are still deeply seated in nerdom: old science fiction movies for example. On DVD I have The Day the Earth Stood Still, Them!, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, MST3K volumes 1 through 9, and the original Godzilla (the original Japanese cut with English subtitles!). I have forced several wannabe nerds to renounce their claims of nerddom with the briefest display of my own nerdly status. The two degrees in engineering don't hurt either.
Star Trek could mostly be relegated to the nerd category. For a technical writing class I took in college, three other students and I performed surveys at the University to determine if there was a correlation between type of major and whether or not one liked Star Trek. Almost 90% of physics majors surveyed enjoyed Star Trek. Over half of all engineers surveyed liked Star Trek. Those majors filled with "normal" people all had numbers below 40%.
-------------------- "Having is not so pleasing a thing, after all, as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true."
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I agree that nerdery is a matter of degree. Back when I was still living in California, some of the regulars at the comic/gaming shop where I worked (sign of geek status #1) harangued me extensively until I gave in and agreed to play Star Wars Trivial Pursuit with them. Kaylen went. Richard went. I went. I won. And the rest of them -- after a shocked silence -- played it out for second place.
I told them they didn't want me to play.
One of our local printing shops has three public use colour photocopiers named Klaatu, Barada, and Nikto.
I almost got the local DNR forestr land named "Soylent Green".
I have lots of friends who watch anime. I have a few who watch subbed instead of dubbed. I have three (besides myself) who know which are better subbed and which are better dubbed. Tenchi Muyo! -- Pioneer put together a durn good translation/voice-actor group and the dubbed version works great. Star Blazers was the first Japanese cartoon I saw back in 1979. I was overjoyed when I finally got the DVD of the original (un-dumbed-down for American audiences) Japanese series.
Degrees. I have a shirt from Steve Jackson Games that says "If you're really a Goth, where were you when we sacked Rome?"... I think that sums it up nicely.
--Jonah
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
Registered: Feb 2001
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"One of our local printing shops has three public use colour photocopiers named Klaatu, Barada, and Nikto."
Ah, but is it a reference to The Day the Earth Stood Still or Army of Darkness? And which would be nerdier? Or is it nerdiest to know that, if you spelled them correctly, they have to be from the former?
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
I think nerdy/geeky-type interests have become more mainstream. I don't think of myself as a geek or a nerd, but which has more force? How you perceive yourself, or how others do? I'm almost afraid to find out what others think of me. . .
posted
Yeah, I know the feeling, how you'd never be able to live up to their expectations if you heard their image of you... It's tough being a decent narcissist these days, the doublethink just doesn't work as well anymore. I find myself more often than not now staring into the mirror and thinking "Well, I'm not that great". Still...
As to nerdity being cool, Lee said it before me, a series of mainstream jumps. The post-postmodernist world we live in, with all the extreme, weird signs of 'hyperreality' popping up like mushrooms in popculture, it's enough to make one dizzy. There's doublethink for you, stars becoming hos, hos becoming stars, "pretentious" being attractive, satire almost losing all meaning. Even the in-crowd don't exactly know what's going on, just that we lost our heading sometime around the premier of "X-Files". Before that (1991-92), shoulderpads and mullets (the last of the original hairstyles) were still kind of ok. Everything since then has been regurgitation, pastiche/imitation of earlier eras and crazy experimentation, in every field anywhere.
The last minute of my dreams are never any fun because I know I'm dreaming and nothing I try to do matters because I know I'm actually already awake. That's what I feel the western world is now, awake and bored, unable to be swept away by a new Beatles-band or Kerouac-novel. *readying pretentious metaphor* When you climb the stairs in a building, eventually you'll get to the roof and just look down. Even the most optimistic professors I've talked to don't think there will be a new book or film genre, not since the 50's detective novels have there been anything new. I think mockumentary is the last new movie genre, correct me if I'm wrong.
Geeks will be the same, though. I liked dictionary.com's phrasing;
quote:an intelligent but single-minded person obsessed with a nonsocial hobby or pursuit
Bundle that together with escapism and compensation habits, you'd have a nice figure I would think. As for coolness of the groups, you never can tell sociologically, since the marketing business might be shaping the desired impressions of the group to earn more money.
It's 15:30, I pulled another all-nighter and can hardly even see straight, and I have to stay up six more hours or risk ruining next night's sleep too. I get these light- and sound-jolts now and then, like Pacino in "Insomnia". Sorry for the stream of consciousness post, it's just the way that one went.
-------------------- "I'm nigh-invulnerable when I'm blasting!" Mel Gibson, X-Men
Registered: Aug 1999
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quote:Originally posted by TSN: Ah, but is it a reference to The Day the Earth Stood Still or Army of Darkness?
Could also be a Star Wars reference.
My FedecKinkos has two called Heckle and Jeckle- the Xerox tech that installed them said another client called them Kirk and Spock, to which I blurted out "That's fuckin' GREAT!"- earning me a dirty look from my supervisor.
Still, pretty cool.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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