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Abstract

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, the future of religion looks remarkably familiar. This essay argues that Star Wars offers a holistic reimagining of American racial formation in a speculative interstellar setting, translating historical practices of othering and alienization into the galaxy’s social and religious order. Across the Skywalker Saga (1977–2019), the Jedi Order functions as a galactic priesthood whose moral universalism authorizes intervention, governance, and salvation across the cosmos. Drawing on American religious history, critical race theory, migration studies, humanitarianism, and imperial studies, I show how alien species, racialized language, colorblind representation, and sacred bloodlines mirror patterns used against Black, Indigenous, migrant, and non-Christian peoples in the United States. Read through this lens, the Jedi embody Christian-Imperial Humanitarianism: a religious-political logic that transforms rescue into sacred hierarchy and legitimizes domination through claims of benevolence and universal moral duty. Star Wars thus imagines a future where racial hierarchy, imperial governance, and salvific religion remain intertwined among the stars.

Author Biography

Taylor Valci (they/them) is a historian of twentieth-century White American Pentecostalism and evangelicalism, currently pursuing their Master of Arts in Religion at Yale Divinity School. Their work weaves personal and expert-witness testimonies into the fabric of their scholarly analysis across the fields of American Religious History, Critical Whiteness Studies, Queer Studies, American Studies, and histories of capitalism, colonialism, labor, and law. Moreover, a wide range of professional experiences, including work as a union organizer and researcher, paralegal at the National Labor Relations Board, nonprofit case manager in unhoused services, classroom history teacher, educational therapist, and certified disability benefits specialist, grounds Valci’s scholarship in human experience. In all that they write and create, Valci ultimately aims to center Liberation, for all people, from all systems of oppression, everywhere.

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