Disasterology: December 2023

This newsletter is a compilation of recent disaster ~things~ that I think are cool, important, or otherwise of interest to people who are intrigued with disaster (broadly defined).

Dear Friends & Foes,

Time to reset your disaster bingo cards. 2024 is sure to bring new horrors and tribulations for Disaster World.

I love a little end-of-year reflection. I think it’s good to evaluate what you’ve accomplished throughout the year and the changes you might want to make in the next year. Even if you didn’t accomplish as much as you’d have liked, if you’re reading this, you did keep yourself alive! That’s really most important. So, congrats!

I’m not going to recap all of this year’s disasters (here’s a bit of that in Grist if you’re interested). Instead, I thought I’d share (or, in some cases, re-share) some of the work I did this year in case you missed it.

I wrote three Op-Eds this year. One for MSNBC pointing out the consequences of underfunded and understaffed local emergency management agencies. Then one for the Boston Globe arguing for the need to increase the state’s emergency management budget. And, finally one for the New York Times showing how we need to reform our entire approach to disaster recovery. I talked to several dozen journalists this year about a range of emergency management issues from budget cuts that ended the emergency management Ph.D. program at North Dakota State University to more speculation about what the demise of Twitter means for disasters, and the local politics of post-disaster policy changes. I did some podcasts like Ten Across and NPLI’s Leader Readycast.

I spent four weeks volunteering with my students in Florida and Louisiana and taught eight classes. I designed and taught a Disaster Film class for the first time. It was a blast. 10/10 do recommend. I did a fair bit of work-related travel, gave a number of talks and guest lectures, and kept this newsletter going.

My colleagues and I published three journal articles this year. One on pre-COVID pandemic planning in state emergency management agencies in the Journal of Emergency Management. Another is on how funding from the Emergency Management Performance Grant is being allocated at the county level in Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy. And, finally, a theory piece that proposes a change to the traditional hazard event scale in the International Journal of Mass Emergencies & Disasters (more on this in a future newsletter).

The real work this year was the grueling slog of chipping away at approximately 976 other research projects – including some archival work! A few hundred hours of that effort is a dead end that won’t lead to anything, but another few hundred hours will. I hope to continue my Research Girl Era into 2024.

Wishing you a restful end to 2023 and a joyful start to 2024.