Date: March 09 (Thursday), 2023, 16:00-18:00

Place: Meeting room 1, 3^rd floor at IRIDeS, Tohoku University

Theme: Disability, disasters, research methodology, interdisciplinarity

Associate Professor Sebastien Boret (IRIDeS), Assistant Professor Hyejeong Park (IRIDeS), and Dr. Supriya Akerkar (Centre for Development and Emergency Practice (CENDEP), Oxford Brookes University, UK) organized a Disability & Disasters workshop, titled “Participatory & inclusive methodologies in disability research: Furthering social justice through co-creation of knowledge.”

The goal of this workshop is to discuss the research methodologies that sought to understand and intervene in these interactions by working collaboratively with people with disabilities, their representative organizations, and allied stakeholders. Three speakers, Dr. Supriya Akerkar: Disability Research, Participatory Methodological Innovations, and CENDEP, Ms. Grace Khawam (Ph.D. Candidate, CENDEP): Job Readiness among Youth with Intellectual Disability in Lebanon: An Inclusive Action Research Framework, Ms. Kate McAuliff (Ph.D. Candidate, CENDEP): Deaf Refugees in Jordan: Double Displacement, Agency, and Knowledge Co-creation, shared their research experiences and ideas for disability and disaster studies. Prof David Alexander (UCL) commented on disaster and disability research and policy. Several participants, online and offline, contributed to an animated discussion on the topics of human rights, social justice, and inclusion as they relate to interdisciplinary perspectives on disability.

This workshop provided a landmark for future collaboration between Japan and the United Kingdom and defined new challenges in disability and disaster studies.

Report: Hyejeong Park (Disaster Medical Informatics Lab), Sebastien Boret (Office for International Collaboration)