Seminar: When "Slow Violence" Accelerates, by Kathryn Gougelet

Kathryn Gougelet will be giving a seminar at ICTA-UAB. This seminar will be a hybrid event, with attendees having the option of attending via Zoom (emailed to you following sign up) or in person at ICTA-UAB.

 

Title: "When "Slow Violence" Accelerates.Toxicity, Comorbidity, and the Ongoing Politics of Landscape Rupture near a Catalan Petrochemical Hub"

Speaker: Kathryn Gougelet, Doctoral researcher at the University of California Santa Cruz, guest researcher at BCNUEJ, ICTA-UAB

Date: Tuesday, February 14th, 2023
Time: 12 PM – 01:30 PM CET
Location: Sala Z/033, ICTA-UAB and online https://www.eventbrite.com/e/when-slow-violence-accelerates-tickets-492329108617?aff=ebdsoporgprofile

 

On Monday, September 26, 2022, a strong smell of gas and burnt rubber started spreading through the neighborhoods closest to the petrochemical hub in Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain. Though smells like this are common enough in the region – especially in the neighborhoods closest to the hub – this time it was a leak of a chemical called naphta, a petroleum derivative with known health effects. And it was so strong that hundreds of residents decided to pick up their phones and call 1-1-2 to report their concerns. As the day went on, more calls came in from communities up the coast, with residents as far north as Maresme calling 1-1-2 to report concerns about the smell. Still, local authorities assured residents, even those who were experiencing respiratory reactions to the substance, that they were safe. The event has brought persistent health concerns to the fore among activists and residents in the region. The local citizen science group Plataforma Cel Net summarizes these concerns through their succinct slogan: Saps què respires? Do you know what you’re breathing? In this talk, I outline some of my early findings from preliminary fieldwork in the Tarragona region, exploring the ongoing politics of pollution and environmental health through Merril Singer’s concept of an “ecosyndemic,” which emphasizes the layering of multiple health concerns, as well as the social, political, and economic contributors to linked environmental degradation and illness. I trace the history of chronic illnesses to a series of landscape ruptures during the late stages of the Franco regime to construct a petrochemical region and integrate an isolationist Spain into a global economy. I follow the subsequent patterns of migration from both within and beyond Spain to the neighborhoods closest to polluting facilities to ask: who is currently most affected by pollution? How might these effects be understood and remediated? Bridging medical and environmental anthropologies, I outline a mixed methods approach -- including public participatory mapping, low-cost air monitoring, and interviews -- for studying ecosyndemic illnesses in the Tarragona region.
 

Researcher description

Kathryn is a medical and environmental anthropologist specialized in human/environmental health in peri-urban regions affected by petrochemical pollution. She holds a BA in environmental studies from Dartmouth College, an MFA in creative nonfiction writing from The University of Arizona, and an MA in cultural anthropology from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she is currently working towards her doctoral degree in anthropology. She is currently conducting doctoral research in Tarragona, Catalunya, Spain, focusing on ecosyndemic health concerns, the uneven spread of environmental contaminants, and advocacy for environmental justice.