Call for Book Chapters - Natural Disasters: Risk, Environmental, and Health Communication

CALL FOR CHAPTERS: Edited Volume on Natural Disasters and Environmental Crisis (Risk Communication, Health Communication, and Environmental Communication).

We invite submissions for an edited volume to be published in late 2017 (contract with Lexington Publishers has been accepted and signed) aimed at upper-division undergraduate students, graduate students, faculty, and libraries.

The impetus for the book is the anticipated Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake detailed in Kathryn Schultz’s (who will write the foreword of this book) Pulitzer Prize winning article, published in the New Yorker on July 20, 2015: “The Really Big One: An earthquake will destroy a sizable portion of the coastal Northwest. The question is when.” At the heart of the story was the warning that in the next 50 years the coast of the Pacific Northwest and its seven million inhabitants will experience the worst natural disaster the continent of North America has ever endured. The journalism was lauded while the story became the topic of conversation, worry, and debate around dinner tables, across related academic fields, and the seismic industry.

You can read the Link to The New Yorker article here: https://chemtrailsplanet.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/new-yorker-the-really-big-oearthquake-will-destroy-a-sizable-portion-of-the-coastal-northwest.pdf

This book will use the framework and uncertainty of natural disasters and/or related types of events related to the intersections between human animals and nature in order to explore how people communicate and make sense of disasters using a risk, health, and environmental communication perspective.

General Guidelines for Submissions:

We are seeking original, previously unpublished submissions. Projects may be at any stage of progress. Data may be qualitative, quantitative, rhetorical, case study, and/or essay based. We are open to research from all disciplines and/or fields that engage risk communication, health communication, and environmental communication related specifically to natural disasters. We are particularly interested in scholarly work related specifically to the Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake and/or topics highly related.

Possible subtopics include – but are not limited – to the following:

- Mother Earth and Nature

- Fear and uncertainty around environmental crisis

- Social media and natural disasters

- Media framing of Natural Events/Disasters

- Seismology/Science of Earthquakes

- Economic implications of disaster (un)preparedness

- Organizational responses to environmental factors

- Calculating Risk and Decision-making

- Global responses and/or reactions to Natural Disasters

- Geographical location (rural and urban)

- Climate Change and preparedness

- Mental Health and Natural Disasters

The tone of articles should be academic, yet be written for a general readership. This project would especially suit scholars who may have already collected data and/or have a manuscript in progress, as we are requesting completed manuscripts by Friday June 30th, 2017. The book will be complete by August 31st, 2017, and be published by Lexington shortly thereafter.

Potential contributors should send an extended abstract (500 words). Your abstract should identify your study’s central research question(s), research method(s) and theories used, and findings or projected findings. To submit, please send your abstract and curriculum vitae by Friday, February 3rd, 2017 to BOTH editors (contact information below). Manuscripts should be APA Style (6th edition) with in in-text citation and reference list. Manuscripts should be no more than 20 pages, excluding reference list and footnotes.

Please send abstracts, questions, and inquiries to both editors: Dr. Vail Fletcher (fletcher@up.edu), Associate Professor in Communication Studies, University of Portland, Oregon and Dr. Jennette Lovejoy (lovejoy@up.edu), Associate Professor in Communication Studies, University of Portland, Oregon.-------------------------------------------------------------------