GLAMOUR IN-DEPTH AND ON-MESSAGE

I've been told that my job - researcher for a television series on disasters - sounds glamorous and exciting. I agree. Here's a list of the glamorous and exciting books I've been reading:

1. HEARING/ Before The/ SUBCOMMITTEE ON/ FLOOD CONTROL AND INTERNAL DEVELOPMENT/ Of The/ COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC WORKS/ HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES/ Ninety-Second Congress/ Second Session/ June 27, 1972, At Rapid City, S. Dak.

I've kept the line breaks because it retains the magesterial quality of "HEARING" and the faint absurdity of "SUBCOMMITTEE ON". Firing systems online! Generators at full power! SUBCOMMITTEE ON!¹ Here is a transcribed sample of the glamorous proceedings that I so glamorously read:

MR. SCHWENGEL: At this point I would like to have the Congressman from this area tell me who this editor is that writes so brilliantly.
MR. ABOUREZK: Is his name attached to it?
MR. SCHWENGEL: I do not see any name on it.
MR. ABOUREZK: Well, it could be any one of those excellent writers down there at the Journal. Paul, do you know who wrote it?
MR. CROSS: Is that on the editorial page?
MR. SCHWENGEL: Yes, it is.
MR. CROSS: It was probably James Kuehn, executive editor.
MR. SCHWENGEL: I think it is a man I met last night and you tell him I made special note of this, will you. Thank you very much.
MR. CLARK: Thank you very much.

Ah yeah. They be saving lives and taking names, fo shizzle.

2. ORAL HISTORY AS A QUALITATIVE RESEARCH TOOL/ IN THE STUDY OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT:/ THE CASE OF THE RAPID CITY FLOOD:/ A DISSERTATION/ SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE FACULTY/ in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the/ degree of/ DOCTOR OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

This is a two-volume, 560-page dissertation on the possible value of talking to people involved in a disaster. The interviews themselves, which were not included in the published work, run to 2900 pages. I had hoped that the thesis would contain the anecdotal evidence of the Rapid City flood that it praises so highly, but the work appears to be theory, data analysis and a dizzyingly complicated framework for converting the ramblings of old codgers who woke up to water-filled houses into useful data for emergency management, which the author helpfully calls "The Emergency Management Cycle Four Phase Principal Element Checklist Comparative Matrix" (SUBCOMMITTEE ON!). I marvel at the layer of analysis and prolix rigour that always needs to be applied to an article of common sense as soon as the dissertationists descend on it.

I can't be entirely partisan in this matter, though; I understand the necessity of such rigour and seeming convolutedness, even as I roll my eyes at it from the safety of a private sector job and the intellectual standards of network television. Being a veteran of disaster interviews myself, I also understand the danger of using oral history as a source of data for engineering projects designed ultimately to save future lives. I've talked to people whom I wouldn't rely on to save my seat at a coffee shop at 3:00 AM, never mind someone's life. I've held interviews and listened patiently to people as they deliver a slop of half-remembered anecdotes, hard-won homilies and bits of received wisdom which may or may not have any bearing on the truth. Base a disaster management plan on these people and you'd have whole cities trusting in God, understanding how precious life is, and blaming bridge collapses on immigrants.

It's not entirely dry reading. In the acknowledgements section, the author pays tribute to a man named Raid Reid Morgan, which must have gotten the guy major points back in his frat days. "Look out, it's Raid Reid!" That kind of thing. "Hey Raid Reid, let's get this kegger moving!" "Come on, Raid Reid, take the blood oath and pick up that hot dog with your butt cheeks!" &c. Also: the first line of the thesis reads "People have struggled with responses to emergencies as far back as, in legend at least, Noah's Ark. In modern times, the concept of an integrated emergency management system has been promoted". I think I prefer the old Biblical responses to emergency management: curse, smite, get drunk, round up the animals and build a boat. In fact, I'm thinking that everyday life should be based around these simple principles. At the first sign of inclement weather, throw down your wine vessel and start grabbing the neighbour's pets. If you don't have a boat handy, run.

parode - exode