If You Grew Up on STAR TREK...

[T'Girl]

Once in a high school social studies class, the teacher was talking about the Black Death in Europe, and I casually mentioned that the plague reached Constantinople in 1334. That was a great moment because people assumed I knew all about it.

Can't help but wonder if your teacher quietly informed you that it was actually the year 1347 that Constantinople was contaminated.

I remember after learning the beginning of phonics that I had the hardest time sounding out and spelling the word "sabataage."

 

[Chrisisall]

I remember after learning the beginning of phonics that I had the hardest time sounding out and spelling the word "sabataage."

"Four-hundred years ago, on the planet Earth, workers who felt their livelihood threatened by automation, flung their wooden shoes, called sabo, into the machines to stop them . . . hence the word: sabotage."

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Can't help but wonder if your teacher quietly informed you that it was actually the year 1347 that Constantinople was contaminated.

He didn't know that. And if Mister Flint mis-remembered the exact year, cut him some slack. As the only living witness, he's still an international treasure.

 

[RandyS]

I think it just made everybody think I was a dork.

Another sad result - I guess it was more than just from Trek, but TV and the movies had lead me to believe that the way Kirk, Bond, James West et al got a different woman every week was the way real life was supposed to work. As I progressed thru high school, I was disabused of this misconception. BIG time.

Don't feel alone there my friend. I can relate.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I think reading books beyond the normal level of my peers and owning a dictionary expanded my vocabulary. Being quiet, bookish and wearing glasses made people think I was smarter than I actually was.

 

[Dantheman]

Being into Star Trek helped, in high school during my sophomore year, a teacher who was a former Marine would start class with words on the board, to increase our vocabulary. One day, one of the words of "Emissary", and I mentioned I knew it from watching Deep Space Nine.

I was also the kind of kid who loved reading comic books and watching cartoons, so I first learned about DNA from the G.I. Joe cartoon storyline where Cobra created Serpentor, and the term "symbiote" from Spider-Man comics with Venom.

 

[Greg Cox]

I'm pretty sure I learned the word "aura" from Silver Age FLASH comics.

As in the Flash's "protective aura."

And I know I learned about "astral projection" from DOCTOR STRANGE.