Fire Humanities

Fire Humanities is a project born out of the University of Idaho's Confluence Lab that aims to foster interdisciplinary inquiry into what it means to live well in a world with more fire and more smoke. As a complement to fire science, Fire Humanities is an emerging field of study that champions the benefits of humanities knowledge and methodologies, and artistic representations, for understanding the increasing presence of wildfire and smoke in our lives. Fire Humanities explores how we create meaning through stories about fire and smoke and how we can build community, including across political divides, by sharing them.

The Simpson Center's partnership with the Confluence Lab began with a Fire Humanities event in April 2026 tied to Stephanie LeMenager's Katz Distinguished Lecture. Thanks to a grant from the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institute Climate Futures Initiative, the partnership will continue in the 2026-27 academic year. The grant, with matching funds from the Simpson Center, the Confluence Lab, and UW's EarthLab, will support three artists in rural Idaho to train as wildland firefighters and share their experiences through their creative practice. The project will also support three workshops: a public workshop co-organized with Humanities Washington; a training workshop for UW faculty and graduate students on how to do public-facing scholarship in the rural Pacific Northwest; and a pedagogy workshop focused on developing modules for teaching about wildfire and smoke in undergraduate humanities courses.

Image by Andreas Rutkauskas