Outer Space Podcast Trilogy
In this episode, I interview David Valentine, Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota.
Our wide-ranging conversation touches on haircuts in space, the colonization of Mars, the rise of the NewSpace community and its ties to billionaires like Elon Musk, and what anthropology can do to ground otherworldly discussions of risk, imagination, and the future.
In this episode I interview Debbora Battaglia, Senior Research Professor of Anthropology at Mount Holyoke College.
We discuss the social life of moon dust; interspecies space projects through the diary of a space zucchini; the psychological shifts of moon-walking astronauts; and cosmopolitics, including a handshake of détente between astronauts and cosmonauts at the height of the Cold War.
In this episode I interview Valerie Olson, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Irvine.
We engage a variety of topics including the limits of the Anthropocene; the rising importance of systems thinking; off-world architecture and increasing space garbage; as well as reimagining the body beyond Earth in relation to twin studies, medicine, and food.
Larger Concept
This AnthroPod trilogy highlights three anthropologists of outer space and coauthors of “Relational Space: An Earthly Installation,” an article appearing in the May 2015 issue of Cultural Anthropology. Incorporating soundscapes created from the recently released NASA audio archive, these episodes aim to place the work of these anthropologists in dialogue with current events and popular culture.
