Disaster Narratives by Design

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A research seminar with Dr Christopher Hood (Cardiff University) as part of the Conflict, Development and Disaster research theme at the School of Modern Languages.

Abstract

Mileti (1999) has argued that disasters are ‘designed’ and are ‘the consequences of narrow and short-sighted development patterns, cultural premises, and attitudes toward both the natural environment and even science and technology’ (ibid:18). If disasters themselves are ‘designed’, what about narratives about disasters? Yacowar (2012) not only categorised disaster movies into types, but also set out 16 conventions of features that appear in these movies. Despite the fact that Yacowar’s work has been cited by many other works over the years, and the work in which it appears has had several editions, it has not been updated since it was originally written in 1976. In other words, it was written prior to the disaster blockbusters of the 1990s, such as Cameron’s Titanic (1997) which is the highest grossing historical disaster movie of all time, and, as of 2018, is the second highest grossing film of all time (Box Office Mojo 2018). This paper looks at whether disaster narratives over the past forty years fit with the conventions that Yacowar put forward and addresses one of the gaps in the original research, in that it focussed primarily on English-language movies, by considering some Japanese narratives also.

Biography

Dr Christopher Hood is a Reader in Japanese Studies in the School of Modern Languages at Cardiff University. He is the author of Japan: The Basics (2014), Dealing with Disaster in Japan: Responses to the Flight JL123 Crash (2011), and Shinkansen: From Bullet Train to Symbol of Modern Japan (2006). He is the President of the British Association for Japanese Studies. Twitter: @HoodCP

Simultaneous Translation

The event will be delivered in the medium of English. You are welcome to ask questions in the medium of Welsh during the QandA session. If you intend to do this, please contact mlang-events@cardiff.ac.uk by Friday 24 January to request simultaneous translation. Please note that 10% or more of those planning to attend will need to request this provision in order for it to be sourced and will be subject to resource availability.

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