Anthropology of Disasters

This course examines disasters from an anthropological perspective. We focus on how disasters have been defined and understood, and work more broadly to see what they tell us about human conditions, vulnerabilities, and capacities for resilience building, survival, and long-term sustainability. Drawing on and comparing case studies from around the world, we also examine the nature of destructive agents; degrees of impact and injury; rescue, relief, and humanitarian responses; and the often slow and uneven process of recovery and resilience building.