Seeing Heat Inequity – Prof. Zoé Hamstead
| Dates: | 15 June 2021 |
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| Times: | 16:00 - 17:00 |
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| What is it: | Webinar |
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| Organiser: | Centre for Crisis Studies and Mitigation |
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| How much: | Free |
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| Who is it for: | University staff, External researchers, Adults, Alumni, Current University students, General public |
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The University of Manchester Centre for Crisis Studies and Mitigation Webinar Series
Seeing Heat Inequity
Prof. Zoé Hamstead
Assistant Professor of Environmental Planning, Director of the Community Resilience Lab, University at Buffalo
Extreme heat is often characterized as a “silent” killer or “invisible” threat. These sensorial modifiers are meant to account for a misalignment between society’s apprehension of heat and the magnitude of damage it causes to people’s health. Unlike hurricanes, tropical storms, and wildfires, heat waves infrequently cause physical damage to infrastructure. Rather, they tend to impact human health directly, and in a way which is perceived individually rather than collectively. Although thermal indicators like temperature may not be perceptible to our visual or auditory receptors, I argue that invisibility is not an inherent property of heat, but one which is constructed in multiple ways: through scientific narratives, in hazards practices, and by institutions which design the built environment. In particular, heat inequity—which puts racial minorities, ethnic minorities, and other marginalized groups at disproportionate risk—is constructed in physical and socio-cognitive spaces. This talk will use environmental justice lenses to describe ways of understanding heat inequity and informing integrative collective action to address the threats that it poses.
Zoé Hamstead is an Assistant Professor of Environmental Planning at the University at Buffalo and Director of the Community Resilience Lab. Her research builds on interdisciplinary approaches in urban planning, geography, and urban ecology to investigate environmental justice dimensions of climate threats and support climate equity planning approaches.
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