But while no anthropologists have been able to visit and directly study the communities that have lived in orbit, we are still able to glean what life in space is like beyond the mission through what space individuals have shared with us while in space or through reflections post-flight. The Astronaut Ethnography project’s initial goal was to collate and synthesize human-centered insights about spacefaring humans into clear areas of investigation and opportunity.
However, a lot is “left on the cutting room floor” when during synthesis — stories and anecdotes that contribute to the larger whole but whose meaningful details are lost during synthesis.This web project is an effort to share these anecdotes, stories, and individual insights in a way that is accessible and easy to navigate, while still preserving the privacy of those whose reflections we’ve included. We hope that those envisioning the next generations of space habitats, technologies, and experiences find value and a richer understanding in the perspectives of spacefaring humans, past and present.
This work is supported by the MIT Space Exploration Initiative and the Translational Research Institute for Space Health.
S. Sharma, N. Klop-Packel, A. Ekblaw, “The Astronaut Ethnography Web Project: Insights from First-Person Accounts of Space.” AC-22,E1,9,19,x68611, 73rd International Astronautical Congress (IAC), Paris, France, 18-22 September 2022. Available at: https://dl.iafastro.directory/event/IAC-2022/paper/68611/
S. Sharma, S. Fish, A. Ekblaw, “Astronaut-in-the-Loop: An Iterative Design Research Framework for Space Environments.” 50th International Conference on Environmental Systems, July 2021. Available at: https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/handle/2346/87265S.
Sharma, S. Fish, A. Ekblaw, “Astronaut Ethnography: A Design Research Approach to Microgravity.” IAC-20,E5,5,7,x60878, 71st International Astronautical Congress, 12 – 14 October, 2020. Available at: https://iafastro.directory/iac/paper/id/60878/summary/