Monday Sep 23, 2019
S1E17 - Recovery
Disasters: Deconstructed Podcast
Reflecting on human society from diverse disciplinary and ideological perspectives to understand the root causes of disasters.
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Episodes
Episodes
Monday Sep 16, 2019
Monday Sep 16, 2019
This week we continue our discussion of the misnomer "natural disaster" and connect with the founder of the #NoNaturalDisasters Twitter campaign, Kevin Blanchard!
Kevin is the Director of DRR Dynamics, a UK-based research organisation focused on ensuring the inclusion and empowerment of marginalised groups in the policy and practice of disaster risk reduction and humanitarian emergencies. He has undertaken extensive work developing inclusive DRR and humanitarian policy for national governments, international agencies and NGO’s.
In the last couple of years, #NoNaturalDisasters has become influential online. We discuss the campaign's origins and vision!
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Kevin on DRR Voices Blog #NoNaturalDisasters - Changing the discourse of disaster reporting
Ksenia, Jason, Lee and JC in Open Democracy
A Dilemma of Language: "Natural Disasters" in Academic Literature - in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Science
Our guests:
Kevin Blanchard (@DRRDynamics and @NoNatDisasters)
Music this week from "Believe the Hype" by SLPSTRM.
Monday Sep 09, 2019
Monday Sep 09, 2019
Today it's just us - your hosts Jason (@vonmeding) and Ksenia (@KsChmutina) - to talk about our 2 years of work investigating the expression "natural disaster" in academic literature.
We reflect on our new paper, A Dilemma of Language: "Natural Disasters" in Academic Literature, and talk more broadly about the importance of language in influencing how people understand risk and how they behave towards it.
Who is served by disasters being understood as natural? Is it actually harmful?
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Our piece in Open Democracy
A Dilemma of Language: "Natural Disasters" in Academic Literature - in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Science
Our guests:
N/A
Music this week from "On the Way" by Ian Post.
Monday Sep 02, 2019
Monday Sep 02, 2019
Disaster risk is created in many complex ways. Today we are so pleased to welcome Gonzalo Lizarralde to talk about how colonization not only historically created risk in so many ways, but how neoliberalism has in fact continued the work of building empire.
It is a conversation you won't want to miss!
Gonzalo is the Université de Montréal Fayolle-Magil Construction Research Chair in Architecture, the Built Environment and Sustainability. He is also the director of the IF Research Group (grif) and the Canadian Disaster Resilience and Sustainable Reconstruction Research Alliance (Oeuvre durable).
His work focuses on understanding project processes, risks, low-cost housing, and informality in urban settings. He is interested in the causes and consequences of rapid urban transformation triggered by disasters, climate change, socio-political conflicts, and economic instability.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
The Invisible Houses - Gonzalo's recent book and an ongoing education initiative about low-cost housing in developing countries.
Our guests:
Gonzalo Lizarralde (@invisibl_houses)
Music this week from "Welcome to My City" by Anton Vlasov.
Monday Aug 26, 2019
Monday Aug 26, 2019
This week Ilan Kelman joins us to talk about climate change and the link to disaster risk. Ilan is a Reader in Risk, Resilience and Global Health at UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction and UCL Institute for Global Health, UK, and a researcher at the University of Agder, Norway.
We discuss whether climate change is to blame for disasters, and how we should talk about the issue. As is the case in many of our conversations so far, we discuss how disasters are not natural and why language and communication is so important.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Visit Ilan's incredibly interesting website and find out more about his work.
A sample of his academic work - Climate Change’s Role in Disaster Risk Reduction’s Future: Beyond Vulnerability and Resilience
A popular science article about climate change and disasters for the Conversation.
Our guests:
Ilan Kelman (@IlanKelman)
Music this week from "Hiemal" by Charlie Ryan.
Monday Aug 19, 2019
Monday Aug 19, 2019
This week we are joined by Dr Samantha Montano to talk about disaster myths. Samantha is an Assistant Professor of Emergency Management & Disaster Science at University of Nebraska Omaha.
In this episode we discuss what it is to be a "disasterologist" and what kind of myths and other destructive disaster narratives that she has dealt with in her work across research, emergency management practice and grassroots community activism.
Of course, the idea that disasters are "natural" features, as you might expect!
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Visit Samantha's website and check out her amazing blog archive!
5 myths about floods - Samantha writes in the Washington Post
Our guests:
Samantha Montano (@SamLMontano)
Music this week from "New Land" by Ian Post
Monday Aug 12, 2019
Monday Aug 12, 2019
In the second part of our discussion with Anthony Oliver-Smith, we discuss how society constructs risk using the example of Florida. He talks to us about his background as an anthropologist and how this field has become more critical in its study of disasters. We also discuss language, politics and the media in relation to root causes of disasters.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Tony's website links to much of his collection of work
Anthropology and the Political Ecology of Disasters
Our guests:
Anthony Oliver-Smith
Music this week from "Lioness" by Valkyrie
Monday Aug 05, 2019
Monday Aug 05, 2019
Today we are delighted to be bringing you the first part of a conversation about "root causes" with Anthony Oliver-Smith. Tony is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at the University of Florida and has been a great inspiration to both of us.
In this first part (of two) we discuss what root causes are and why it is so important to look beneath the symptoms, when we analyze disaster impacts. Tony gives us some wonderful examples from his expansive career that illustrate how disaster are anything but natural.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Tony's website links to much of his collection of work
Anthropology and the Political Ecology of Disasters
Our guests:
Anthony Oliver-Smith
Music this week from "Lioness" by Valkyrie
Monday Jul 29, 2019
Monday Jul 29, 2019
This week we spend some time around the table with Emmanuel Raju and Giuseppe Forino, our i-Rec Conference Co-Chairs, to discuss the field of disaster studies and whether any claim to being radical holds water!
We discuss some of the barriers to critical scholarship and the reluctance of those with power to allow a discourse that is based on a rigorous critique of the status quo. We talk about the political-economic-social factors underpinning risk creation and the injustice of the systems that dominate our world.
Where do we go from here?
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Power, Prestige & Forgotten Values: A Disaster Studies Manifesto
Our guests:
Giuseppe Forino - @G_leipheimer
Emmanuel Raju - @EmmanuelRaju7
Music this week from "Stand Down" by Luminar
Monday Jul 22, 2019
Monday Jul 22, 2019
This is the second part of our discussion with Dr JC Gaillard about capacities. Please listen to the previous Episode (S1E7) first if you haven't yet!
Today we dig deeper into the role of power in determining responsibility for vulnerability reduction or capacity enhancement. What about cultural contexts where we are outsiders? Can we presume to be acting ethically?
Also, Jason has some spare time to monologue ;)
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Anderson & Woodrow 1989 - Rising from the Ashes: Development Strategies in Times of Disaster https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Ashes-Development-Strategies-Disaster/dp/1555878008
Gaillard et al. 2018 - People’s capacities in facing hazards and disasters: an overview https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11069-018-3519-1
Gaillard 2010 - Vulnerability, capacity and resilience: perspectives for climate and development policy https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jid.1675
WCDRR: How do homeless people deal with hazards and disasters?, JC Gaillard - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja2zzksjjZk
Our guest this week:
Follow Dr JC Gaillard on Twitter @jcgaillard_uoa
His academic profile is hhttp://www.env.auckland.ac.nz/people/jc-gaillard
Personal Website https://jcgaillard.wordpress.com/
Music this week from "Impavid" by Charlie Ryan.
Monday Jul 15, 2019
Monday Jul 15, 2019
The knowledge, skills and resources that people can draw on and share to help deal with hazards and disasters - their capacities -must be central to any coherent strategy.
Could it be smarter to put efforts into building capacities rather than reducing vulnerabilities?
Today we talk to Dr JC Gaillard in the first of 2 episodes on capacity/capacities.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DisastersDecon
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Further information:
Anderson & Woodrow 1989 - Rising from the Ashes: Development Strategies in Times of Disaster https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Ashes-Development-Strategies-Disaster/dp/1555878008
Gaillard et al. 2018 - People’s capacities in facing hazards and disasters: an overview https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11069-018-3519-1
Gaillard 2010 - Vulnerability, capacity and resilience: perspectives for climate and development policy https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jid.1675
Our guest this week:
Follow Dr JC Gaillard on Twitter @jcgaillard_uoa
His academic profile is hhttp://www.env.auckland.ac.nz/people/jc-gaillard
Personal Website https://jcgaillard.wordpress.com/
Music this week from "Impavid" by Charlie Ryan.
About Disasters: Deconstructed
Jason and Ksenia bring you regular content reflecting on human society from diverse disciplinary and ideological perspectives to understand why disasters really happen.
There is no other podcast centering the most marginalized in disasters-a “people’s” story; recurring themes are structural violence, inequality, injustice, resistance and organizing.