Space Travel and Culture : From Apollo to Space Tourism

Explores the significance of the first Apollo moon landing and how the countless books, films, and products associated with factual space fiction had an affect on popular culture and artistic practice, but not social sciences and humanities Investigates how a topic is hugely important in popular culture, but almost invisible in the academy, and how it makes us want to ask questions about visibility, or perhaps self-censorship Evaluates how little impact the space age actually had on the social sciences and humanities - partly because its combination of military-industrial cold war politics, combined with patriarchy and big science, sits uneasily with contemporary thought in these areas Provides an interdisciplinary collection of essays on various aspects of NASA, the moon landing, and the commercialisation of space generally The book travels from hard engineering to space romance, echoing the variety of attempts to blur science and culture that we find in the chapters

David Bell is Senior Lecturer in the School of Geography at Leeds University. His interests span critical human geography and cultural studies, and include cultural policy, urban and rural cultures, consumption and lifestyle, science and technology, and sexuality.

Martin Parker is Professor of Culture and Organization at the University of Leicester School of Management. His latest writing has been about the Mafia, angels, pirates, and skyscrapers.