JC Gaillard reading group and drinks reception, 30th June 2022 from 2:00pm to 4:30pm

JC Gaillard in person reading group and drinks reception, 30th June 2022 from 2:00pm to 4:30pm 

Join the Institute of Hazard, Risk and Resilience for a one-off reading group tutorial surrounding his new book ‘The Invention of Disaster: Power and Knowledge in Discourses on Hazard and Vulnerability’. The reading group will be followed by drinks reception. Room to be confirmed.

Title: The Tout-Monde of disaster studies

Abstract: This seminar will build upon and expand some of the key tenets of a recent book titled The Invention of Disaster: Power and Knowledge in Discourses on Hazard and Vulnerability. The book questions why we, disaster scholars, argue that disasters are social constructs while we continue to use concepts and methodologies inherited from the Enlightenment that we take for universal in understanding the experiences of people across very diverse cultures and societies. Addressing this epistemological tension requires to reconsider some ontological assumptions about disasters, including normative expectations about life that lead to drawing a line that sets the dis- in the -aster. It further entails to accept that there may be multiple truths about disaster and that these multiple truths cannot be essentialised. They are likely to be hybrid or creole, that is, that they integrate multiple influences that reflect historical heritages and contemporary globalising forces. As such, moving beyond the hegemonic and normative legacy (in its own diversity) of the Enlightenment in disaster studies will entail focusing on diversity and plurality but also hybridity and the inherent opacity of cross-cultural encounters and relations - themes that this seminar will draw from the philosophy of Martinican novelist and poet Edouard Glissant.

For further information:
https://www.durham.ac.uk/research/institutes-and-centres/hazard-risk-resilience/
For queries:
ihrr.admin@durham.ac.uk