Week 12

For this weeks readings the authors discussed resilience and adaptation plans and social vulnerability and the use of black feminist thought in planning. One of the main questions raised was "can social vulnerability offer insights to help guide planning efforts and solutions(Jacobs 2018, 2)? If we define social vulnerability as the characteristics of a person or group in terms of their capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist and recover from the impact of a natural hazard, then my answer is yes. The articles emphasis on Black feminist thought was very interesting to me. We have previously studied the black women that headed their local grass roots organizations and were pivotal in making changes that affected their local communities. However we never discussed black feminist thought as a theory or guidelines by which to abide by or suggest. I like the turn of events.

My feelings on this weeks readings are that of appreciation. Just as we studied the queering of social movements and most recently the queering of Katrina, I can see this type of dialogue happening with black feminism being used as the root of environmental and social planning. Malcolm X said the most endangered person in the US was the black women. I can only corroborate this statement with the fact that black feminist thought is being used to uplift the rights of all marginalized peoples because of terms like intersectionality and other aspects of black feminist thought that include all marginalized groups and the numerous identities of those groups. I may be off but from my understanding it seems like to save the planet its best done through the eyes of a black women. Just a thought that you should let sizzle in your spirit.


Key Words

Social Vulnerability: the characteristics of a person or group in terms of their capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist and recover from the impact of a natural hazard.

Black Feminism: aim is the realization of a just community through a process of self-conscious struggle that empowers women and men to actualize a humanist vision of community.

Resilience: a cross disciplinary term used to define the capacity for which a system can stand without losing any major functions. The term is being increasingly used in environmental debates and urban and disaster planning.