Race and Cultural Taboo: Refugee Disaster Vulnerability and Resilience

Introduction

In the field of emergency management and crisis communication, disaster preparedness has been a critical component. Multi-hazard Mitigation Council estimated that six dollars are saved in disaster repairs for every dollar spent on prevention and mitigation (Gall & Friedland, 2020). In this research, disasters include weather-related disasters such as tornados, flooding, and other types of disasters, including the current pandemic COVID-19. Disasters of various types and complexities demand that preparedness professionals reach out to all citizens. The Federal Emergency Management Agency conducts annual national household surveys to track progress in disaster preparedness for individuals and communities. However, immigrants and refugees are typically thought of as being more vulnerable to disasters. By definition, a refugee is “someone who is unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion” (UNHCR, 2010, p.3). Because of the cultural and language barriers, refugee communities may be treated as social outcasts and hard to reach for disaster planners, managers, and responders (Warner & Engel, 2014). Also, due to the language barriers and limited access to information technology, there is still a significant gap in understanding the refugee populations’ crisis communication, risk perception, and disaster preparedness at the local level. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) claimed that the impact of COVID-19 on the lives of resettled refugees remains unknown, and it is imperative to meet refugees' healthcare and everyday needs (CDC, 2020).

Within a specific community, cultural values, norms, and taboos influence and shape community practices, resources, and interactions, selecting, rearranging, or rejecting different types of information. A community that copes with disasters and crises depends on cultural understandings, community structure, and economic interests. Beliefs, persuasions, customs, norms, or taboos might prevent people from cooperating in actions that seem beneficial from an outsider's view during natural disasters or public health crises (World Disasters Report, 2014). For instance, during a public health crisis, refugee populations’ interpretation of illness and well-being might differ from biomedical explanations. The lack of understanding of the cultural differences might lead to the vulnerable or marginalized groups missing out on emergency preparedness planning and response assistance.

Also, refugee identity has been a worldwide race taboo. In Europe, the refugee crisis is associated with social turbulence. In 2015, Europe saw a sharp rise in the number of refugees from war-affected countries. Media portrayed refugees as invaders and threats to the host countries' physical, economic, and cultural well-being (Krzyżanowski et al., 2018; Zunes, 2017). Also, the word “refugee” has been a controversy that emerged in the U.S. public sphere. Refugees were described as homeless, aimless, with little material possessions. The term “refugee” is directly related to a sense of vulnerability and powerlessness that contradicted the value of self-sufficiency and prosperity of the United States (Masquelier, 2006). They are always viewed as others in the host country. Thus, it is vital to understand how race and cultural taboos are perceived and communicated and impact crisis communication and disaster preparedness. The purposes of this research are: (1) to understand the risk perception and the culturally specific needs of refugee communities in response to disaster threats; (2) to understand their survival networks and the associated cultures among themselves; (3) to provide and improve the future crisis communication and emergency management policy-making; (4) to enrich the academic literature on social vulnerability and community resilience in crisis communication and emergency management research.