Skip to main content

Search

Photo Essay: Exhibition 03.20.2021

Photos from a talk and exhibiton about the Formosa Plastics Global Archive, held on March 20, 2021 at 柏林廢墟Tacheles in Taipei, Taiwan. All photos by Jiao Enguan 焦恩光.

dsc_0033.jpg

pece_annotation_1479064932

Sara.Till

1) Hocas: an anglicized ottoman-Turkish word meaning "master, professor, teacher"; it evolved from "khawaja", and is an honorific title given to a teacher of the Muslim faith, particularly a sufi teacher. 

2) Tonic-clonic seizure: formerly described as "grand mal seizures", they include two sections (hence the "tonic" and "clonic"). The tonic phase includes the initial rigor and consciousness, while the clonic phase is the characteristic muscle spasms. These phases each last around 1 minute and 3 minutes, respectively.

3) Jinns: anglicized to "genie", this is the term for a supernatural creature in the Muslim faith. Many of the patients interviewed in Dr. Good's work spoke of a terrifying event prior to the onset of their epilepsy, often involving the presence of a "jinn". 

pece_annotation_1480270896

Sara.Till

1) "It is important to note that these changes that incorporated gender-based violence into the human rights realm also brought the law to bear as a primary instrument of change and struggle. Calling this ‘governance feminism’, Janet Halley argues that this was the work of a certain group of feminists who came together in the 1990s, taking criminal law as a primary instrument of reform, and working in a top-down fashion to institute punishment for a global war against women."

2) "This approach inherently limits the mode of intervention. The mandate of humanitarianism – again, as defined by the new wave of ‘sans frontiere-ism’ exemplified by ` MSF – is not to reform or improve the kind of life one lives, only to preserve life itself. And yet gender-based violence is about the kind of life one lives. Under the rubric of human rights, freedom from gender-based violence is part of a parcel of rights that define what it means to be human in ways that include the right to be free from violence, the right to equality and the right to dignity"

3) "In MSF’s General Assembly debate, Rony Brauman, the former president of MSF, suggested that rather than descending into politics, humanitarians should make a distinction between describing what one witnesses, and qualifying it, which entails making a judgement. He asked one of the MSF Holland representatives, ‘How do you know the women were raped? Did you see it happening?’ Brauman proposed sticking close to what one sees, and letting others take it from there – he felt strongly that MSF should not have called for action. For him, and many others, humanitarianism is not about justice, politics or taking sides. The MSF Holland representative responded that there was a slippery slope between political neutrality and irresponsibility, and a fierce debate ensued"

pece_annotation_1473114885

Sara.Till

Dr. Schmid's fourteen-page report includes an additional four pages of references. These references date from mid-twentieth century (1961) to mid-summer 2012 (publication of the book was 2013). The list includes studies, reports, policies, review articles, and publications, spanning from radiation absorption of Strontium to overarching reviews of nuclear energy to organizational reliability studies. These sources, if nothing else, indicate Dr. Schmid has crafted her report from multiple angles, and is not simply re-hashing Fukushima reviews. 

pece_annotation_1480865625

Sara.Till

As mentioned earlier, this group is heavily experienced in dealing with traumatic injuries and responding to larger scenes. I imagine the hardest challenge they face is funding; they typically run on a budget made of a few hundred thousand dollars. This encompasses salaries for some personnel (although the vast majority are voluntary), classes for CPR, EMT, First aid certification, and supplies. With such a large call volume of complex cases (think of all the resources needed to treat an individual with multiple gun shots to the chest or someone who has been stabbed several times), this is quite extraordinary that they can function adequately with such little funding.

pece_annotation_1474231692

Sara.Till

This article seems to focus more on the overarching theme of global medicine. This does include aspects of emergency response (such as discussing how various agencies respond to emergencies or how they formulate protocols) as biosecurity seeks to minimize or eradicate health emergencies. However, as the article contends, biosecurity is not a functional ideal at this time; it primarily contends that our current models of biosecurity are undermined by several factors, leaving them as simply emergency responses.