march 30, 2021
Image credits: " Stanford Torus cutaway ", NASA/Rick Guidice, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Within the Institute of Civilizations at the Collège de France, the Anthropology of Life team, headed by Perig Pitrou, studies the diversity of conceptions of life in human societies. From a comparative perspective, its members conduct long-term ethnographic surveys on living techniques (agriculture, animal husbandry, hunting, medicine) and biotechnologies.
As part of a partnership between PSL University and University College London, the Off Earth Atlas project (2021-2023) has been selected to strengthen collaborations in the field of space studies.
Led by anthropologists and historians, this interdisciplinary program aims to publish an "Atlas of Life in Space" (Off Earth Atlas) and put a virtual exhibition online. In London and Paris, workshops will bring together representatives of the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences, as well as specialists in visual studies, to reflect on contemporary issues linked to exobiology and space exploration.
Under the responsibility of Perig Pitrou (anthropologist, CNRS research director) and Elsa De Smet (historian, PSL postdoctoral fellow), this interdisciplinary project will be led by the Anthropologie de la vie team of the Laboratoire d'anthropologie sociale (Collège de France/CNRS/EHESS), as an extension of IRIS/PSL's " Origins and conditions of the appearance of life " activities. At University College London, the project will be led by Victor Buchli (anthropologist and co-director of the UCL Space Domain), David Jeevendrampillai (anthropologist, director of the Centre of Outer Space Studies (COSS)) and Delphine Mercier (historian, Collections curator).
