Dr. Susanna M. Hoffman
Disaster Anthropologist
Ph.D., U.C. Berkeley
Author Speaker Consultant
Background
Dr. Hoffman is an internationally recognized expert in disasters. Utilizing the multi-faceted approach of anthropology, she strives to answer the questions of “why” and “how” disasters occur. She reveals the accumulated knowledge of populations, their social structures, their use and perception of the environment, their calculation of risk, their historical coping mechanism, and the factors that have brought about their vulnerability. Cultural understanding also takes into account the political and economic factors of the affected population and increases the opportunity to provide solutions for disaster preparedness and survival.
Dr.Hoffman started and chairs The Risk and Disaster Commission of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnographic Science
Initiated and was the first chair of The Risk and Disaster Group of the Society for Applied Anthropology
Board member of the Culture and Disaster Action Network (CADAN)
“By failing to understand the cultural context of disasters and how that culture interacts with its physical surroundings, both disaster preparation and response fail to deliver the comprehension of what led to the calamity as well as the actions necessary to resolve the upheaval and forestall future events. Without that insight, a singular disaster can turn into an enduring calamity and preclude the mitigation of the next catastrophe.”
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International Speaking:
Keynotes, Papers, and Presentations
Dr. Hoffman gives around thirty keynotes, papers, and presentations on disaster issues a year, at conferences, disaster sites, and congresses of researchers, policy makers, and practitioners. Some of the places she has spoken are: India, China, Turkey, Sweden, Greece, Denmark, El Salvador, Brazil, Poland, and all over the United States. A few examples are:
Northern European Emergency and Disaster Society,
The United States Meteorlogical Society
Conference on Gender and Disaster, Ahmadabad, India
Second India Disaster Management conference, New Delhi, India
The United States Natural Hazards Meeting
International Risk and Disaster Reduction, Beijing, China
The Risk and Disaster Conferences in Chengdu, China and Kunming, China
Anthropology of Risk and Disaster Conference Coimbra, Portugal
The New York Institute of Technology
The International Union of Anthropological and Ethnographic Sciences Posnan, Poland; Sendai, Japan; Florianopolis, Brazil; Dubrovnic, Croatia; Posnan
Conferences in Milan, Amsterdam, Uzbekistan, Almanti, Khazakstan,
Africa Center for Disaster Risk Reduction, Potchesfroom, South Africa
Swedish Security and Defense Departmen, Karlstad, Sweden
More
Books
Articles and Chapters
Dr. Hoffman has written more than forty articles and chapters.
Here is a Selection
(complete citations available upon request)
“Disaster and Climate Change”
“Katrina and Rita, A Disaster Anthropologist Perspective”
“After Atlas Shrugs: The Question of Culture or Persistence After a Disaster”
Disaster Upon Disaster: The Gap Between Risk and Disaster Knowledge, Policy and Practice
“Disasters and Their Impact: A Fundamental Feature of Environment”
“The Monster and the Mother: The Symbolism of Disaster”
“Culture:The Crucial Factor in Hazard, Risk, and Disaster Recovery”
“A Map of Recovery: A Survey of the Stages Most Disaster Survivors Endure.”
“Applying Disaster Understanding in Mitigation, Preparation, Recovery, and Aid,”
Films
Kypseli: Men and Women Apart-A Divided Reality
An award winning and celebrated film that depicts how people divide time, space, material possessions and activities and how the division determines social structure and ideology. This classic and still best-selling film is used nationwide and worldwide in courses in cultural anthropology, European ethnography and women’s and gender studies. “A strikingly beautiful and important work that should not be missed.” With Richard Cowan and Paul Aratow.
The Nature of Culture, part of the series Faces of Culture. PBS Emmy Award
“A provocative study of the structure of process of culture.”
Forthcoming Works.
Nostalgia (Pain of Past), Escalgia (Pain of Home), and Topalgia (Pain of Place): The Deep Cultural Complexities Behind the Persistent Problematic of Displacement and Resettlement (Berghahn Books, 2021)
Inplacement: Global Outbreaks and the Anthropology of Isolation, with Virginia Garcia-Acosta (Berghahn Books 2021)
The Politics of Sympathy (TBA)