Commando gender scientists
Sometimes you read things in the paper that just blow you away. I recently read in a newspaper that the earthquake disaster in Haiti created an acute need for gender scientists in the area. Fortunately, we were able to deploy a team within days.
It didn't strike me as the most crucial sort of expert to send to a disaster area, but as I read the article it became clear to me just what their role was. Apparently the 2008 Pakistan earthquake highlighted the need for various social scientists to be in the field in order to understand how to deal with the people in the area.
An example from the Pakistan earthquake was how rescue workers had trouble getting women out of buildings that risked collapsing. They refused to leave, causing massive delays in situations where time was of the essence - a problem which was solved by the simple expediency of having the rescue workers bring blankets with them which they could wrap the women in, thereby saving them from being uncovered outdoors, something which was completely alien and unacceptable to them.
Other problems where social scientists helped included the fact that people in the disaster areas might not point out locations of homes belonging to people of a lower social status than the mainstream of the community, for example poor people, people of other ethnicity, people of other religions, or women. Being aware of a problem like this and knowing how to deal with it is something a social scientist can do.
The article pointed out more examples, and put them a lot better than I can recall them, and in the end I completely understood why these people were needed in Haiti...
...but I still couldn't shake the mental picture of academical looking middle aged men and women dressed in boring, brown suits being dropped in parachutes over a jungle, holding books, folders and binders with research materials in their arms.
Not to mention the dramatic scenes preceding that. Picture a chaotic assembly room in the UN headquarters, people shouting and waving their arms in distress, graphs displaying the critical shortage of gender scientists in the background, the chairman banging his gavel to restore order. And in the middle of it all the Swedish ambassador to the UN stands up cooly and says "Don't worry. We've got this."
In the next scene we see transport planes in a Swedish military airfield, just before daybreak. The engines are warming up, cargo doors yawning open, and academicians filing into the cargo bays with their research material in their arms and with looks of grim resolve on their faces. Music, of course. Stirring cadences on drums and dramatic violins.
Next a shot of the transport planes and their helicopter escorts flying against the sunrise over the Atlantic. Michael Bay would totally do it.
It didn't strike me as the most crucial sort of expert to send to a disaster area, but as I read the article it became clear to me just what their role was. Apparently the 2008 Pakistan earthquake highlighted the need for various social scientists to be in the field in order to understand how to deal with the people in the area.
An example from the Pakistan earthquake was how rescue workers had trouble getting women out of buildings that risked collapsing. They refused to leave, causing massive delays in situations where time was of the essence - a problem which was solved by the simple expediency of having the rescue workers bring blankets with them which they could wrap the women in, thereby saving them from being uncovered outdoors, something which was completely alien and unacceptable to them.
Other problems where social scientists helped included the fact that people in the disaster areas might not point out locations of homes belonging to people of a lower social status than the mainstream of the community, for example poor people, people of other ethnicity, people of other religions, or women. Being aware of a problem like this and knowing how to deal with it is something a social scientist can do.
The article pointed out more examples, and put them a lot better than I can recall them, and in the end I completely understood why these people were needed in Haiti...
...but I still couldn't shake the mental picture of academical looking middle aged men and women dressed in boring, brown suits being dropped in parachutes over a jungle, holding books, folders and binders with research materials in their arms.
Not to mention the dramatic scenes preceding that. Picture a chaotic assembly room in the UN headquarters, people shouting and waving their arms in distress, graphs displaying the critical shortage of gender scientists in the background, the chairman banging his gavel to restore order. And in the middle of it all the Swedish ambassador to the UN stands up cooly and says "Don't worry. We've got this."
In the next scene we see transport planes in a Swedish military airfield, just before daybreak. The engines are warming up, cargo doors yawning open, and academicians filing into the cargo bays with their research material in their arms and with looks of grim resolve on their faces. Music, of course. Stirring cadences on drums and dramatic violins.
Next a shot of the transport planes and their helicopter escorts flying against the sunrise over the Atlantic. Michael Bay would totally do it.