Anthropology and Risk

ISBN-13: 9780415745635 / Angielski / Miękka / 2015 / 190 str.

Asa Boholm

Opis

Drawing on theory from anthropology, sociology, organisation studies and philosophy, this book addresses how the perception, communication and management of risk is shaped by culturally informed and socially embedded knowledge and experience. It provides an account of how interpretations of risk in society are conditioned by knowledge claims and cultural assumptions and by the orientationof actors based on roles, norms, expectations, identities, trust and practical rationality within a lived social world. By focusing on agency, social complexity and the production and interpretation of meaning, the book offers a comprehensive and holistic theoretical perspective on risk, based on empirical case studies and ethnographic enquiry. As a selection of Asa Boholm's publications throughout her career, along with a newly written introduction overviewing the field, this book provides a unified perspective on risk as a construct shaped by social and cultural contexts.This collection should be of interest to students and scholars of risk communication, risk management, environmental planning, environmental management and environmental and applied anthropology.

Spis treści

1. Introduction 2. Comparative Studies of Risk Perception 3. Cultural Theory of Risk 4. The Cultural Nature of Risk 5. Speaking of Risk: Matters of Context 6. The Public Meeting as a Theatre of Dissent: Risk and Hazard in Land Use Planning 7. Visual Images and Risk Messages: Commemorating Chernobyl 8. On the Organizational Practice of Expert-based Risk Management: A Case of Railway Planning 9. Bibliography

O autorze

Åsa Boholm is Professor of Social Anthropology at Gothenburg University, Sweden, and has published on historical, cultural, organizational and institutional dimensions of risk for over twenty years.