Seminar ‘Researching risk and floods in a Jakarta slum’

How do slum dwellers protect their physical and mental well-being when their assets and health are continually threatened by increased river flooding? How can we understand their practices in anticipation of, during, or right after floods? These are the main questions that have led to my anthropological PhD-research on the ways in which residents of a severely flood-prone neighbourhood in Jakarta (Indonesia) live with – and protect themselves against- frequent floods. In this lecture I will discuss the main findings of this research, and relate these to literature on urban risk and social inequality.

Roanne van Voorst defended her PhD-dissertation on flood risk in the beginning of 2014. She is a Lecturer in Anthropology and Asian Studies at the University of Amsterdam, in the department of Sociology and Anthropology.

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