Fortun, Kim. 2020. "COVID-19 and Compound Vulnerabilities," Open Seminar for the Transnational Disaster COVID-19 Project edited by Duygu Kasdogan and Kim Fortun. Irvine, CA: Disaster STS Network.
The Economist on postponed health care worldwide.
ProPublica on how climate change won't stop for the coronavirus pandemic.
Al Jazeera on how the COVID-19 pandemic puts wildlife conservation at risk in Kenya.
This discussion will examine compound vulnerabilities produced by COVID-19, how they are being governed in different places, and the modes of governance being held up as models. The questions to be address include these:
What is compounding vulnerabilities as COVID-19 unfolds?
Which social groups are particularly vulnerable and marginalized in different COVID-19 settings? What contributes to and compounds their vulnerability?
How is COVID-19 knowledge and expertise moving across national borders -- then shaping regulatory measures, clinical practice, scientific research, public participation, and other modes of response?
How is the aftermath of COVID-19 crisis being imagined in different settings? How is this shaping beliefs, practices, and policies?
Governing Places and Compound Vulnerabilities
See time conversions. Email Kim Fortun for Zoom link ([email protected]).
We'll start with a shared reading of Aalok Khandekar’s draft commentary, “Heat and Contagion in the Off-Grid City” then we’ll discuss how compound vulnerabilities are being characterized and addressed in different places -- the Navajo Nation (Dinétah), for example (see questions focused on different places here and the beginnings of place-focused digital essays here)
The last part of our discussion will focus on how models of COVID-19 governance (from South Korea, Sweden and the Indian state of Kerala, for example) are traveling, debated and translated into practice in different settings. To prompt thinking about the latter, see Al Jazeera’s (50 minute) film, Lessons from Asia, which examines response to the pandemic in China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.
All of the items in this digital collection (including the digital essays focused on particular places) can be annotated using the question set for Reading COVID-19 Commentaries (you are welcome to add questions to this set.). Attach annotations to the item being annotated.
Also address these cross-cutting research questions for the Transnational Disaster-STS COVID-19 project (selecting Questions About Governance and Compound Vulnerabilities, attaching annotations here)
To work in this digital workspace, you'll need to register if you haven't already -- through the link in the top right-hand corner here. Email Kim Fortun ([email protected]) for next steps.
Next week’s discussion -- Friday, June 5 -- will return to scholarship that we can use to frame our analysis of COVID-19, focusing on critical theorizations of place.
Draft submission to Somatosphere for the series “Dispatches from the pandemic.”Read more