4. Cultural Constructs of Risk

They generally have 2 way of conventional risk management; disaster risk management, they are very directive, they are saying that okay in order to reduce the risk, you should do that you have some specific goals and you have some specific actions to perform and while doing it, they are also very reactive, they think that this is the only way to solve the problem.

Conventional risk management often takes a directive approach, telling people what specific actions to take to reduce risks. This means there are set goals and specific methods to achieve these goals. However, this method can be limited because it only offers one way to address risk and tends to react to problems rather than anticipating them. This approach may not address the complexities of cultural influences on how people perceive risk.

Think of traditional risk management like a fire alarm that only goes off when there is smoke. It tells you to evacuate the building but doesn't educate you about how to prevent fires in the first place. While it's essential to have alarms, it's also crucial to teach people about safety measures and prevention.

Here, we are talking from the cultural perspective of risk. For the cultural perspective of risk, individuals are active information seeker, they are not the passive recipient of information but they also collect informations to develop their own perception, own perspective okay.

From a cultural perspective, individuals actively seek out information related to risks rather than passively receiving it. This means that people's understanding and perception of risk are shaped significantly by their cultural background and personal experiences, leading to different viewpoints on the same risk factor.

Imagine two people watching the same news report about a health risk. One might ignore it because their culture emphasizes strong health practices, while the other might be very concerned because their culture has a history of that particular health issue. This shows how culture affects their perception and reaction.

So, how you are looking at it from which angle, from which perspective, it matters. Here is another good example that how dad sees it, how the kid experience it and how mom sees it, so it’s not actually maybe that does not matter the length but when it varies from person to person, individual to individual, group to group, institution to institutions, this same stimulus we see in a different perspective, in a different angle.

Risk perception varies based on individual experiences and cultural contexts. For example, a child may perceive a risky situation (like a loud noise) differently than their parents, showing that the same event can have many interpretations based on personal and cultural influences.

Consider a family hiking in the woods. The child might see the steep cliff as an exciting adventure, while the parents view it as a dangerous threat. Each family member perceives the same situation differently based on their experiences, highlighting the subjective nature of risk perception.

So, there was an outstanding work by Purity and Danger, 1966 considered to be modern classic of anthropology, so Mary Douglas in her book in 1966, Purity and Danger is talking about the cultural importance of risk, the cultural perspective of risk that we would look into why, what is culture and why it is so important.

Mary Douglas, in her influential book 'Purity and Danger', emphasized the cultural dimensions of risk. She argued that understanding culture is essential for effective disaster risk management, as culture shapes how risks are perceived and communicated. Douglas illustrated that without considering cultural factors, risk communication and management strategies may fail.

Think of a community preparing for a hurricane. If the local culture values communal decision-making, strategies that isolate individuals (like individual alerts) may not work. Instead, a culturally-informed approach that fosters group discussions can be more effective, showing how understanding cultural context is critical.

Now, these Leviticus to the Israeli people they are saying hey, no pork on my fork, you cannot eat pork okay, no pork on my fork so, Mary Douglas was curious why Israeli people are restricted not to have pork, why they cannot eat pork, what is the reason, why they seen it is a kind of risky pollutions.

Mary Douglas examined the dietary laws in Leviticus regarding pork consumption among the Israeli people, highlighting that cultural beliefs play a critical role in the perception of food as 'clean' or 'unclean'. The prohibition against pork is rooted in cultural understandings of health and purity, which influence dietary choices.

Consider how some cultures promote eating insects and others view it as unthinkable. Insect-eating cultures see it as a healthy protein source, while in cultures where it's taboo, it’s often deemed unsafe or disgusting. This highlights how cultural context shapes dietary perceptions.

So, Mary Douglas was trying to understand why this is so and then she came up with the idea, taxonomic anomalies on dietary restrictions. Mary Douglas found that according to the Leviticus, according to the Jews Israeli, people cannot eat pigs because pigs are anomalies.

Douglas's concept of taxonomic anomalies explains that certain animals, like pigs, are categorized differently based on their physical characteristics. Pigs have cloven hooves but do not chew cud like other similarly categorized animals, which makes them anomalies and thus considered unclean within Israeli dietary laws.

Imagine classifying animals like students in a school based on certain characteristics. If one student has unique traits that set them apart, they might be seen as different. Similarly, pigs are seen differently because they don’t fit the expected category norms, influencing cultural perceptions of risk.

But why should only Israeli uniquely care about classificatory anomalies? Douglas was, of course, arguing that such concerns are not unique to the Israelis but thrive today in support of social structure or many other tribal societies.

Douglas argued that concerns about dietary and cultural classification are not exclusive to Israelis but are a part of human societies globally. Different cultures have various unique dietary rules that shape their understanding of risk, leading to a broader view of how risk is perceived.

Take vegetarianism in various cultures. Some cultures strictly avoid meat for ethical reasons, while others may do so because of health beliefs. Both perspectives inform cultural dietary norms and approach to risk, showing the cultural basis of food-related risks.

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