Dear Mike,
I'm just finishing my honours thesis on children in the anthropology of
disasters, asking why they aren't, so have been looking at this area for
most of the year. The info you want is pretty scattered, but the following
might help:
Maureen's suggestion is very helpful, some of the contacts from the
conference, as well as Jonathon Spencer Rose, are,
Raquel Cohen, U Miami Medical School & Deborah Thomas, Hazards Research Lab.
U South Carolina.
Disasters, Vol 18, No 3 1994 was dedicated to children in disasters- very
useful. Jo Boyden did a paper on children's experience of conflict related
emergencies.
More recently Cultural Survival Quarterly, Summer 2000 did a special report
on Rethinking Childhood: perspectives on children's rights with several
articles on street and working children in India and Africa- not directly
tied to disasters but very helpful leads. Jo Boyden is listed there as
Senior Research Officer at the Refugee Studies Centre at Oxford U.
UNHCR has numerous documents under www.unhcr.ch/issues/children/children.htm
UNICEF in Turkey Vol. 1-2 2000 available on-line addresses the earthquake
and street children programmes.
Other print links:
Glauser, Benno, (1997) Street children: deconstructing a construct, in A.
James & A. Prout (eds) Constructing and reconstructing childhood. London:
Falmer Press.
Saylor, C. (1993). Children and Disasters. NY: Plenum Press.
Gordon, N., Farberow, N. & Maida, C. (1999). Children and disasters. London:
Brunner/Mazel.
The problem with the last two, and with almost all the literature
specifically on children and disasters, and I'm not sure if you are finding
this as well, is that it derives almost exclusively from western
perspectives and constructions of children and childhood as vulnerable,
incompetent, fragile beings, linked to developmental stages, as passive
receivers of adult culture. Most of the literature does not perceive
children as active social agents, or see children in disasters as moving in
culturally specific environments, and chidren seem to be captured in a
medicalized narrative, under psychological trauma. Many of the post disaster
manuals which are available are also written from a western cultural
perspective, and sometimes quite hilariously inappropriate for many children
around the globe in disaster situations.
Hope these are some help anyway
Best wishes
Riki Marten
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