as small as a world and as large as alone

3:01am July 27, 2015

Another minor character who only appeared in one episode that I’d like to see more of: Yeoman Zahra.  Who only appears in the episode, “Operation: Annihilate”. 

She’s the only woman in any of the above pictures, she’s tasked with recording everything they see on the mission, to the point where she isn’t even armed apparently, she carries a recording device while everyone else carries phasers, and records while everyone else shoots at things.

Why are most of the female characters in TOS these minor one-off characters, especially women of color?  Don’t answer that, I think I already know.

Looking up the name Zahra on Wikipedia (because I know that they sometimes named characters for Reasons), I found:

The female given name Zahra is a common name which corresponds to three different, though related, meaning depending on the country it is being called.

• Arabic: زهراء‎, pronounced Zahra’, meaning beautiful, bright, shining and brilliant.
• Arabic: زهرة, pronounced Zahrah, meaning flower, blossom, or beauty.^[1][2]
• Persian: زهرا‎, pronounced Zahra, is a further spelling variant, meaning sparklingly bright and beautiful.

The Ottoman and Persian empires have expanded the use of these names to Slavic countries and the Indian subcontinent, respectively. Zahra is also used as a surname, particularly in Malta.

The names are difficult to distinguish in transliteration, and may be transliterated in various ways, such as Zehra, Zohra(h) and Zohre

Zahra seems to be her last name.  It doesn’t say anywhere what her first name is.  Why are minor characters far more interesting to me than the actual plotlines or most of the major characters?  (I love the interactions between Kirk, Spock, and Bones as much as anyone, but I like Sulu and Uhura more than any of the more “major” characters and I get super interested in characters like Yeoman Zahra or Lieutenant Masters, who only show up once and then disappear the entire rest of the show.  Also I get pretty interested in unnamed characters who walk around in the background in the corridors and such.  Oh also I love the unnamed Horta mother (she gives Spock the name of her species, but not her own name, which is weird), she’s another serious favorite character, although she’s not part of the Enterprise crew at all.)

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