Suchergebnisse

Research that occurs in the context of emergencies and disasters requires attention to challenging contexts and circumstances. This book walks readers through the ways in which those contexts can be managed to produce careful, rigorous, and scholarly work. Each chapter provides an overview of approaches, methods, and techniques with illustrations from established disaster studies.

N the aftermath of a traumatic disaster, Mennonite Disaster Service arrives to help. Established in 1950, associated volunteers have gone into devastated communities to pick up debris, muck out homes, and launch rebuilding efforts. These volunteer efforts have succeeded in building more than homes, however. Called the therapeutic community by disaster researchers, acts of volunteerism can generate healing moments. Though most studies see such therapeutic effects happening right after disasters, this ethnographic study looks at long-term recovery assistance. Such extensive commitment results in beneficial consequences for survivors and their communities. For Mennonite Disaster Service volunteers, serving others reflects deeply upon their historic roots, cultural traditions, and theological belief system. In contrast to the corrosive blaming that erupted after hurricane Katrina, and feelings of neglect by those who experienced Rita and Ike, the arrival and long-term commitment of faith-based volunteers restored hope. This volume describes and explains how Mennonite Disaster Service organized efforts for the 2005 and 2008 Gulf Coast storms, following a well-established tradition of helping their neighbors. Based on deeply-ingrained religious beliefs, volunteers went to the coast for weeks, sometimes months, and often returned year after year. The quality of the construction work, coupled with the meaningful relationships they sought to build, generated trusting partnerships with communities struggling back from disaster. Based on five years of volunteer work by Mennonite Disaster Service, this volume demonstrates best practices for those who seek to do the same

Demographic shifts have put minority groups and the poor at greater risk to disaster during the last decade. Problems of sheltering and housing for these groups occurred following the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in Watsonville, California. To mitigate future problems, disaster planners must identify various ethnic groups and other groups in a community. Diversity must be built into the disaster response during the planning stage. Researchers should continue and expand work related to diversity and disaster.

This research looks at possible relationships between mass media reporting and voluntarism in disaster-threat situations. The setting is a small mid-western city in the United States which was inundated by flood waters in March 1982. Data were collected through interviews with volunteers, organizational and public officials, and the media. Additionally, numerous documents pertaining to the media and volunteers are content analyzed. Observations made on-site supplement the interviews and documents.The media are found to have some effect in accordance with the suggestions of dependency theory. The media are also found to have been one of several instigators of increased voluntarism. Conflict arising out of media depiction of the volunteer effort is discussed. Further research on media effects of voluntarism in disaster situations is suggested.