Risk & Disaster TIG

Jennifer Trivedi
Noémie Gonzalez Bautista
Mei Johnson

The Risk and Disasters Topical Interest Group (R&D TIG) and its members are continuing efforts to increase diversity and inclusion, to fight racism and systemic oppression, to support intersectionality, to promote anthropological practice and research with disasters, to explore the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects, and to better understand risk and disaster more broadly. 

The R&D TIG’s Anti-Racism Committee (ARC) is continuing Its work to develop resources and tools to support the TIG’s and members’ efforts to promote anti-racism, diversity, inclusion, and intersectionality. While this work progresses, the TIG’s listserv and social media are already working to share existing information, resources, and opportunities from BIPOC authors, researchers, practitioners, and organizations.

Several members of the R&D TIG presented at the 2020 Natural Hazards Workshop and Researcher’s Meeting, bringing anthropological research and perspectives to a wider disaster research audience, moderating panels and presenting on issues related to “Culturally Relevant, Community Guided, and Scientifically Informed—Setting a Vision for Action,” “Hope and Collective Action,” “Just Dialogue: An Intergenerational Conversation on Justice, Sustainability, and Abundance,” “Diverse Communities and Effective Risk Communication in COVID-19,” “The Data Revolution—Ethical Imperatives and Methodological Considerations for Hazards and Disaster Research,” “Holistic and Effective Applications of Big Data in Disaster Research,” “Setting a Research Agenda to Build Resilience,” “Dynamics of Social Vulnerability in Disaster Risk,” and more. 

In addition to sharing their work virtually, a range of articles and books are newly out or forthcoming soon from R&D TIG members, each of which adds new information and insight to anthropological understandings of risk and disaster. 

The second edition of The Angry Earth: Disaster in Anthropological Perspective, edited by Anthony Oliver-Smith and Susanna M. Hoffman, published late last year, building on the first edition of the book with new material and postscripts. 

Disaster Upon Disaster: Exploring the Gap Between Knowledge, Policy, and Practice, edited by Susanna M. Hoffman and Roberto E. Barrios, with chapters from the editors, as well as Terry Jeggle, Stephen Bender, Adam Koons, Jane Murphy Thomas, Shirley J. Fiske, Elizabeth Marino, Brenda D. Phillips, Anthony Oliver-Smith, Ryo Morimoto, Mark Schuller, Katherine E. Browne, Heather Lazrus, Keely Maxwell, and Ann Bergman out with Berghahn Books. 

Recently published in the Annals of Anthropological Practice is “’Imagining a More Just World’: Interview with Julie Maldonado,” written by Julie Maldonado, Mark Schuller, Lacey Benedeck, Halle Boddy, Katelyn Kramer, Evan Blankenberger, Ardyn Cieslak, and Christine Jenkins. In the interview, Livelihoods Knowledge Exchange Network (LiKEN) Associate Director Julie Maldonado discusses her book, Seeking Justice in an Energy Sacrifice Zone: Standing on Vanishing Land in Coastal Louisiana, with Mark Schuller’s Northern Illinois University Anthropology and Contemporary World Problems class.

Adriana María Garriga-López edited a special issue of the North American Council on Latin America (NACLA) Journal, A Report on COVID-19 in the Americas, "SOLO EL PUEBLO SALVA AL PUEBLO: Cultivating Care and Surviving the Pandemic" with work by Camila Gelpí-Acosta, Tamara Oyola Santiago, Pato Hebert, Edgar Rivera Colon, Manuel Alejandro Rodríguez Rondón, Claudia Rivera Amarillo, Beatriz M. Reyes-Foster, Whitney Duncan, Gilberto Rosas, Virginia Raymond, Shakti Castro Camacho, Isa Rodriguez Soto, Chris Garces, Jorge Cuéllar, Leonardo Dupin, Beatriz Ribeiro, Teishan Latner, Johanna Fernandez, and Ana Portnoy Brimmer.

Elizabeth K Marino and A.J. Faas ask “Is Vulnerability an Outdated Concept? After Subjects and Spaces” in the Annals of Anthropological Practice. 

Jennifer Trivedi’s book, Mississippi After Katrina: Disaster Recovery and Reconstruction on the Gulf Coast, forthcoming later this year, also discussed in her recent piece “Biloxi’s 15-year recovery from Hurricane Katrina offers lessons for other coastal cities” in The Conversation. 

Mark Schuller’s latest book, Humanity’s Last Stand: Confronting Global Catastrophe, with a forward by Cynthia McKinney, forthcoming in January 2021. 

Forthcoming in December in the special issue on COVID-19 of Human Organization is “Entangled Roots and Otherwise Possibilities: The Anthropology of Disasters COVID-19 Research Agenda” by A.J. Faas, Roberto Barrios, Virginia García-Acosta, Adriana Garriga-López, Seven Mattes, and Jennifer Trivedi.

Erin Eldrige published two articles: one in Anthropology Today entitled “Between Georgia and Ohio: Constructing the Covid-19 Disaster in the United States.” and one in Human Organization entitled “Navigating the ‘Bureaucratic Beast’ in North Carolina Hurricane Recovery.”

Jeremy Spoon published an article in World Development entitled “Navigating multidimensional household recoveries following the 2015 Nepal earthquakes”  and another one in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction entitled “Anatomy of disaster recoveries: tangible and intangible short-term recovery dynamics following the 2015 Nepal earthquakes”. He also presented in August 2020 at the International Symposium on Nepal’s Reconstruction, livestreamed on Facebook, a talk called “Understanding household recoveries following the 2015 Nepal earthquakes” with Drew Gerkey, Ram B. Chhetri, Alisa Rai, Umesh Basnet, and Chelsea E. Hunter.

We have also rolled out a new resource, a linktr.ee site that makes finding our presence online easier. Learn more about where you can follow the R&D TIG at https://linktr.ee/RiskDisasterTIG, and don’t hesitate to share it!