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Researcher:

Dr Victoria Carpenter, Head of Research Development

During recovery after hurricanes, the lack of collaboration between the two social actors of recovery – local communities affected by hurricanes and parish councils tasked with recovery projects – leads to conflicts, prolonged recovery period, and wasted resources. This comes (among other things) from the discord in the social actors’ language of sharing emotions and exchanging knowledge. In order for the two sides to negotiate the period of recovery successfully, they need to use common language of shared emotions and knowledge exchange that characterises this period.

My research into the language of shared emotions and knowledge exchange in the aftermath of disasters shows that there is a space where the government and the public experience the same emotions but use different language to express them. If the language from both sides is combined and given back to the social actors, they will be able to articulate their shared emotions in such a way that creates a stable shared emotional sphere within which they can collaborate by exchanging and accepting each other’s knowledge. This will benefit both communities and parish councils because they will work together to run recovery projects that are beneficial to both sides (useful for the communities and not wasting resources of the council).

Publications

‘Dancing in a Hurricane: State and Public Responses to Hurricane Gilbert in Jamaica’, Caribbean Quarterly, 68:1 (2022), 44-66, DOI:

‘When a Habit Meets a Habit at the City Dump: Persistence and Adaptability of Habit in Única mirando al mar by Fernando Contreras Castro’, Forum for Modern Language Studies 59:2 (2023), 183-201,