Space Humanities Initiative at Rice Launch and Social

IN-PERSON: Join us at the official launch of the Space Humanities Initiative at Rice.

From the Rice News story: "Long before rockets, satellites or space stations, humans were already in a relationship with outer space. People looked up and named constellations. They told stories about the moon. They wrote poems, mapped stars and built myths around lights in the sky they could not touch. Across cultures and centuries, outer space functioned as more than a scientific mystery; it was a mirror for human longing, fear, imagination and hope.

"As NASA prepares for the launch of Artemis II — the first crewed mission around the moon in more than 50 years — two Rice University scholars are asking what it would mean to treat that long human relationship with space as not just a footnote to engineering but as a central intellectual pursuit.
That question became the foundation of Rice’s new Space Humanities Initiative, a collaboration between Alexander Regier, the William Faulkner Professor of English and chair of the Department of English and Creative Writing, and David Alexander, director of the Rice Space Institute and professor of physics and astronomy. The initiative brings together scholars across disciplines to examine how space exploration both shapes and is shaped by culture, language, ethics, history and imagination."

Full story: https://news.rice.edu/news/2026/rockets-there-were-stories-rice-explores-human-meaning-space

Rice event page and registration: https://events.rice.edu/event/428616-space-humanities-initiative-launch-and-social

NOTE: RSVP'ing on this Meetup page DOES NOT mean you are registered for the event itself.

Brockstein Pavilion on the Rice interactive map: https://map.concept3d.com/?id=473#!ct/71275,71276,71277?m/122265?s/Brochstein%20Pavilion

Parking Facilities and Rates: https://parking.rice.edu/parking-facilities-and-rates