Jennifer Trivedi
Assistant Professor, Anthropology; Core Faculty Member, Disaster Research Center | University of Delaware
Newark, DE, UNITED STATES
Prof. Trivedi's research explores disaster vulnerability, response, recovery, resilience and decision-making.
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Biography
Jennifer (Jenn) Trivedi received a Ph.D. and M.A. in anthropology from the University of Iowa and a B.A. in history from the University of Georgia. She was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Disaster Research Center at the University of Delaware from 2016 to 2018, working on a large NSF-funded evacuation study, collaborating extensively with civil engineers and atmospheric scientists, and conducting quick-response research following flooding in Louisiana, Hurricane Matthew, and related inland flooding and the false ballistic missile alert in Hawaii.
Trivedi's work focuses on the historical and cultural contexts surrounding disaster vulnerability, response, recovery, resilience, and decision-making. She is engaged in multiple ongoing research projects, including studies of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on different groups in the United States; hurricane evacuation decision-making and timing as part of an interdisciplinary team; varied cultural aspects of disasters; and long-term recovery processes.
Trivedi is the author of Mississippi after Katrina: Disaster Recovery & Reconstruction on the Gulf Coast (Lexington Books, 2020), which examines the cultural-historical context in long-term recovery from Hurricane Katrina in Biloxi, Mississippi, building on her ethnographic fieldwork there in 2006 and 2010-2011.
Trivedi is a current member and social media manager (@RiskDisasterTIG) of the Risk and Disaster Topical Interest Group (R&D TIG) in the Society for Applied Anthropology (SFAA), as well as a former R&D TIG co-chair.
Areas of Expertise (6)
Disaster Resilience
Disaster Response
Disaster Vulnerability
Disaster Recovery
Hurricanes
Flooding
Media Appearances (5)
A Caribbean island's quest to become the world's first climate-resilient nation
BBC online
2023-04-19
This element of neighbourly communication is hugely important for early warning systems, says Jennifer Trivedi, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Delaware's Disaster Research Center.
Covid Hazard Pay Has Ripple Effects in Today’s Overtime Cases
Bloomberg online
2022-07-26
Covid hazard pay started disappearing for many workers by the summer of 2020, months before they would get access to vaccines, said Jennifer Trivedi, a professor at the University of Delaware’s Disaster Research Center.
Hurricane Delta aims for 'devil's playground'
E&E News online
2020-10-09
"With adaptation and resilience, we can get caught up in talking about things like managed retreat and home buyouts and things like that," said Jennifer Trivedi, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Delaware. "But for a lot of people it comes down to a simple question, ‘What do I need to survive? Once I know that, I’m going to make the best choice for me and for my family.’"
Nearly a third of Americans worry about having their work hours cut or losing their jobs
Marketplace online
2020-09-01
“I’ve definitely had some of these same worries and uncertainties myself, and then thinking through what, what happens if I do lose my job? Where, where do we go from there?” said Jenn Trivedi, who teaches anthropology and studies disasters at the University of Delaware.
Hurricane Katrina hit Biloxi 15 years ago. Here’s what other coastal cities can learn from its recovery
Fast Company online
2020-08-29
The one-two punch of tropical storms Marco and Laura along the U.S. Gulf Coast eerily echoes Hurricane Katrina’s arrival 15 years ago, on August 29, 2005. Katrina, which caused some $170 billion in damages, remains the most costly storm in U.S. history.
Articles (5)
Imagining an ethnographic otherwise during a pandemic
Human Organization2022 By understanding pandemics and compounding disasters as disruptive sociopolitical processes rooted in histories and geographies of systemic inequality, we reflect on both novel and familiar manifestations of research practice, ethical decision making, and responsibility during the COVID-19 pandemic. We advocate for the importance of flexible, care-driven research methods that forefront local expertise and collaborations and relational ethics that are, oftentimes, at odds with neoliberal and institutional temporalities. Lastly, we reflect on how our own positionalities and experiences shape how we have navigated, reconceptualized, and challenged our own research practices in the context of a global pandemic.
Community resilience: toward a framework for an integrated, interdisciplinary model of disaster
Natural Hazards Review2021 The science of resilience presents the opportunity to explain how natural, social, and physical systems interact to impact community functioning and well-being postdisaster. This paper describes the development and theoretical foundation of a comprehensive conceptual model, presenting a shift from the usual thinking about resilience to construe resilience more precisely as the trajectory of postdisaster recovery, with community functioning and well-being as the outcome of interest. Unique contributions of the results include the identification of the natural, social, and physical systems that are implicated in disasters, and the dynamic nature and directionality of how these elements relate in the context of hazards.
Hurricane evacuation beliefs and behaviour of inland vs. coastal populations
Environmental Hazards2021 Although hurricanes can cause severe hazard effects well inland, little is known about the evacuation behaviour of inland populations compared to coastal populations. Using survey data collected in the United States after Hurricanes Florence (2018), Michael (2018), Barry (2019), and Dorian (2019), we investigate differences between coastal and inland populations in evacuation decisions and timing, and their causes. The data indicate that coastal populations evacuated at a higher rate than their inland counterparts (those not in coastal counties) in every hurricane studied. Chi-square tests identified differences in characteristics of coastal and inland populations, and a multiple logistic regression identified variables associated with evacuation.
Is This Still Triage? Or Are We Back to Teaching?
Teaching and Learning Anthropology2021 The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted teaching over the past year, pushing many instructors and students into remote learning. These changes have forced new discussions about serious issues with the digital divide and an array of intersectional inequities, and they have prompted conversations about the physical and mental health of everyone involved. While initial transitions to remote learning were treated as distinct from previous in-person or online learning, increasingly we are seeing a push to “return to normal.” This essay argues that pandemic recoveries take many forms, and risk and uncertainty must continue to shape our teaching. We must continue to engage with critical issues related to inequity, intersectionality, and broad discussions of health if we are to ensure a safe return.
COVID-19: What Do Recoveries Look Like?
Practicing Anthropology2021 COVID-19 recoveries will not only be rooted in the pandemic itself but also questions of access, rights, and resources that long pre-dated the emergence of the virus or people’s responses to it. While such recoveries have not yet begun, signs are already emerging that indicate the risks of a “return to normal” that leaves many without equal, affordable, and often wanted and needed access to virtual or real-world spaces and resources. Examining and questioning these issues now, during short-term recovery efforts, and in the years and decades of long-term recovery to come are essential to working towards a more just system of COVID-19 recoveries.
Education (3)
University of Iowa: PhD, Anthropology 2016
University of Iowa: MA, Anthropology 2007
The University of Georgia: BA, History 2004
Links (5)
Languages (1)
- English
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