Analyze

Danielle Koonce in an Opinion piece in the Fayetteville Observer, states...

"And it’s not just household garbage coming in — chemical waste and coal ash has also been disposed of in the Sampson County landfill."

"We listened to community members share how they can no longer garden or enjoy the outdoors due to the thick odor and fumes from the landfill."

"We learned that the landfill receives trash from around the state, from as far away as New York City, and even trash that comes in on ship-barges through Wilmington."

While Bryan Wuester, manager for the Sampson County Landfill states in the Sampson Independent...

"The Sampson landfill accepts waste from North Carolina only, about 5,450 tons from 16 different counties a day."

"The landfill accepts three kinds of waste: construction and demolition materials, solid waste and special waste, which are byproducts of industry. No coal ash comes into the Sampson facility..."

These are two different stories of the landfill coming from two different stakeholders, one in which needs the landfill to be in operation for a job and the other a concerned citizen worried about the disproportional impacts her community faces. While Danielle Koonce listens to the realities of the community members located around the landfill who express concern and worry, the landfill manager denies these realities and insists they are not true. This is not only invaliding to the community members who are fighting to get their voices heard but further embeds environmental injustice into the community.  

Early local organizing that uses conflict and difference as a way to generate transformative solutions. Solutions that serve more then one worldview instead of growing otherness, separateness, and hierarchy. In the book Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown, brown states... 

At the human scale, in order to create a world that works for more people, for more life, we have to collaborate on the process of dreaming and visioning and implementing that world. We have to recognize that a multitude of realities have, do, and will exist.

An example of success using this strategy is the Dogwood Alliance in joint with other partners who put a stop to a wood pellet mill in Lumberton, NC. The article located on the Dogwood Alliance webpage about this victory states the following. 

THE CLOSURE OF THIS FACILITY IS ALSO A WIN FOR OUR CLIMATE. THE BURNING OF THESE PELLETS WOULD HAVE ADDED THOUSANDS OF TONS OF CARBON DIOXIDE TO THE ATMOSPHERE, THE EQUIVALENT OF 155,580 CARS ON THE ROAD.

Link to this webpage: https://www.dogwoodalliance.org/2022/04/statement-wood-pellet-mill-stop…

I've been organizing and working with the Research Data KE Working Group. We have been collecting relevant links, articles and data in this essay. Some members of our group are now going deeper into thematic areas such as looking at gender and its intersection with COVID-19 in Kenya. We have a monthly call on the second Thursday of every month. We also have a WhatsApp chat group to exchange links and articles. We are open to new members, sign up here. You can find an archive of all of our calls and notes here.

The training of and role for the (humanist?) intellectual in the world seems to be a relevant take-away point of discussion from postcolonial theory. I have been noticing a proliferation of thought pieces and various genres of writing by engaged scholars in this COVID-19 moment. While indeed there is lots to think and write about, the Late Industrial times we are in are also marked by a heavy saturation of information. Rather than feeling enlightening and motivated by the increased proliferation of opinions on COVID-19, I find it has the opposite effect. What other (new) forms of knowledge, processes for knowledge making, and ways of engaging in the world (not to mention education for critical consciousness) are needed in this moment? Perhaps unsurprisingly, I find the value and strength of new research collectives like this one to be rich spaces from which to start thinking about this question.

Ahmed describes the importance of a "humanist education" that trains the “ethical reflex” to open one up to forms of consciousness fundamentally different from one’s own. He notes that such openness eventually requires one to “rebel” against one’s training itself (developing critical consciousness?).

Ahmed also writes about the relationship where the intellectual refuses to speak for the subaltern--where the intellectual enters into a relationship with something foreign to him about which he will absolutely refuse ever to produce authoritative knowledge. "The point of the relationship is, in fact, "to question the grounds of knowledge itself."

I live in the bay area in Northern California and am a PhD Candidate in the Department of Anthropology at UC Irvine. My research has focused on shifting data ideologies in Nairobi, Kenya where I lived and worked from 2010 - 2015 and 2019. Learn more here. I can be reached at angela[dot]okune[at]gmail[dot]com.

I am especially interested in the following questions:

• How is COVID-19 knowledge and expertise moving across national borders?

The aim of the program is to provide courses to train Haitians to enhance their rehabilitation skills as Haiti has a lack of the rehabilitation professionals (this situation happened with both of before the earthquake and aftermath). After taking the courses, the citizens can either be rehabilitation technicians or orthopedic technicians.

The development funding is not mentioned in the article or from the university sites. Therefore, personally will assume that the funding is raised by the university and relevant engineering associations.

OSHA has collected data and reports from the followings:

• ž   Injuries, Illnesses, and Fatalities (IIF) program - U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
• ž   Inspection Data
• ž   Industrial Hygiene Air Sampling Data - Chemical Exposure Health Data
• ž   Severe Injury Reports

Personally would find the discussion and argument within the MFS members are compelling as the discussion had highlighted almost all the issues they have faced. Whereas these issues have become their pressure source and the fuse of their arguments. As mentioned above, the points made by their argument are valuable for any parties that intend for future serves within these areas, theoretical plans do not work in such areas which required an enormous amount of practices, and there is no ideal environment for ideal operations (~49:00 – 51:00). 

The connection for the patients and the providers can build upon the gamified health assessment via the smart phone device. Then these data are input to the provider’s section and the organizations’ section for further analytical uses. The engagement with the patients can also be done with licensed Video Chat for therapy. Or the let the patients input their information with a trackable plan.