FEMA Trailers
by Jae Rhim Lee
Note: As I write this, months of logistical, administrative, and bureaucratic preparations are being finalized so that a surplus, used, FEMA travel trailer can be donated to the MIT Visual Arts Program and delivered to the site of an old paint factory on the MIT Campus. The FEMA Trailer is set to arrive at MIT on April 30, 2008.
The FEMA Trailer is the focal point
of a course I teach called "Understanding the Problem: Research
as Artistic Practice," a series which was originally conceived
by Ute Meta Bauer, Curator, Associate Professor, and Director of the
MIT Visual Arts Program in the Department of Architecture. THE
MIT FEMA Trailer Project is the first module in the "Understanding
the Problem" series which seeks to examine how research, in the
context of artistic practice, can be a tool for understanding contemporary
issues.
The FEMA Trailer is at the center
of many controversies related to environmental justice, government actions,
and psychosocial health that have been unveiled in the wake of Hurricane
Katrina. In this article I will describe the MIT FEMA Trailer
Project and discuss the framework and methodology adopted to understand
the "problems" of the trailer. The Project is still
in its infancy, so the framework and methodology are a rough guide to
the project's trajectory, which I expect will evolve significantly over
time. As such, I welcome any feedback or comments. My contact
information can be found at the end of this article.
As an introduction to a central
theme of the FEMA Trailer Project, I will present another project that
I am working on concurrently, N=1=0=Infinity.
N=1=0=Infinity: The Infinity
Mushroom, Burial Suit, and Embalming Solution
N=1=0=Infinity is a burial system for the composting of corpses. The project, a work-in-progess, will take two forms:
1) the design and production of a new hybrid mushroom, the Infinity Mushroom which will facilitate the decomposition of corpses, remediation of accumulated toxins from corpses, and the delivery of corpse nutrients to plant roots. The Infinity Mushroom will be a genetic hybrid of mushrooms which individually feature abilities to utilize ammonia and/or nitrate and remediation mushrooms which target common toxins accumulated in the body over a lifetime,
2) the Infinity Burial Suit, a
fitted burial suit embroidered with thread that is infused with Infinity
Mushroom mycelium (prototype pictured), accompanied by the Infinity
Embalming Fluid, a slurry containing Infinity Mushroom spores
The Environmental Working Group's
Human Toxome Project and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's
Biomonitoring Program are two initiatives which monitor the levels of
industrial chemicals and pesticides accumulated in the body, known as
"body burden." The Human Toxome Project's EWG/Commonweal
Study #1 found 171 of 214 industrial compounds in the blood and urine
of 9 adult participants, including chemicals linked to birth defects
and developmental delays, immune system toxicity, and cancer.
In this study, 44% of the group had high levels of chlorinated dioxins
and furans, while 56% had moderate levels. Chlorinated dioxins
and furans are produced as contaminants or byproducts in industrial
manufacturing, human exposure is generally through digestion of contaminated
foods--generally high fat foods such as dairy, eggs, and animal fats,
and elevated levels of these chemicals are associated with immune system
sensitization and allergies, birth defects and developmental delays,
and cancer (http://www.ewg.org/sites
Body burden is proof of the physical
connection between the self-body and the planet--the industrial toxins
we insert into the planet eventually find their way into our bodies
through food, water, air, and manufactured objects. At the same
time, the body is the symbol of our immortality, so we distance ourselves
from our bodies in order to be protected from the harsh reality that
we are animals who urinate, defecate, die, and decay. Modern sanitation
systems are designed to instantly whisk away the unpleasant, frequent
reminders of our mortality, our urine and feces. We squander potable
water and energy to dispose and disinfect our waste which could otherwise
fertilize our soil. Contemporary western funerals prescribe embalming
the body in formaldehyde and sealing it in a casket. Originally
intended to facilitate the return of soldiers' deceased bodies during
the Civil War, today the purpose of formaldehyde embalming is to inhibit
decay so that open casket viewings are possible. In this final
act, we commit our last injustice to the planet--the creation of toxic
burial sites and the denial of the planet's right to our body's stored,
accumulated energy and nutrients. The cultural denial of death
demands a disconnect between self-body and planet, which in turn has
negative consequences for the environment. The
The Infinity Mushroom proposes
an alternative relationship between the self-body and the planet.
The intimate, physical connection between self-body and planet made
evident by the acumulation of environmental toxins in the body, is contrasted
with the psychological divide between self-body and planet via the mechanism
of death denial. N=1=0=Infinity concedes human abuse of the environment
which has allowed industrial pollutants to enter our bodies and proposes
a method of reintegrating the self-body-planet while at the same time
providing a practical tool for ecological burial. Human toxicity
becomes, in essence, an instrument for the reconnection of self, body,
and planet.
TERROR MANAGEMENT THEORY AND ENVIRONMENTAL
SUSTAINABILITY: Reconciliation of the Self, Body, Death, and the Environment
In William James' configuration
of the self, the body is relegated to a secondary role. According
to James, the self is dialogical--the self as knower ("I") perpetually
overseeing the self as known ("Me"). The body is the "innermost
part of the material self" which happens to be one of four "constituents"
of an even larger three parts of the "Me". The boundary
between the self and not-self is thus defined not in physical terms
but rather in ephemeral thought (1890).
Yet in much of psychology's history,
the body has played a significant role in the development, construction
and ongoing negotiation and development of the self. In Lacan's
Mirror Stage, the infant begins to develop a sense of an "ideal-I"
as a result of seeing its reflected body. D.W. Winnicott and others
believe the body to be the physical boundary of the self (1965).
Fisher argues that the psychological boundary of the self is rooted
in the experience of the body (1986). Antonio Damasio and other
cognitive psychologists propose that the self is merely a checking system
of physiological states (2003). Terror Management Theory posits
that because the body is a constant reminder of mortality, we engage
in efforts to regulate the body in order to elevate the body from animal
status to that of cultural symbol, thereby minimizing our vulnerability
to death (Goldenberg and Pyszczynski, et.al, 2000).
In The Denial of Death, Ernest
Becker argues that the struggle for heroism is central to human nature,
based on "organismic narcissism" and our innate need for self-esteem,
and is a reaction against the fear of death: "Society itself
is a codified hero system, which means that society everywhere is a
living myth of the significance of human life, a defiant creation of
meaning." Our existential fears are centered around the body,
the symbol of our mortality. Becker writes: "[T]he existential
dilemma, the essence of man: we are half animal, half symbolic."
This duality of body and conscious self is irreconcilable, for "[H]is
body is a material fleshy casing that is alien to him in many ways" the
strangest and most repugnant way being that it aches and bleeds and
will decay and die." (1973)
Psychologists Jeff Greenberg and
Todd Pyszczynski developed Terror Management Theory (TMT) in homage
and response to Becker’s work. Goldenberg and Pyszczynski,et.al.
(2000) argue that because the body is a constant reminder of mortality,
we engage in efforts to imbue the body with meaning in order to elevate
the body from animal status to that of cultural symbol, thereby minimizing
our psychic vulnerability to death.
Ernest Becker’s Denial of Death
and Terror Management Theory suggest that the body and self/soul are
somehow separate entities that are connected but at odds with one another.
The body perpetually asserts itself via excrement, hunger, pain, exhaustion,
and sexual desire. The self attempts to elevate itself into a
symbol of transcendence, one that is immortal and therefore immune from
the smells and tastes of the (lesser) mortal body.
Ecopsychology proposes that the
best antidote to environmental degradation and the alienation and “false
identity” created by the urban-industrial system is a recovery of
the ecological unconscious, the fundamental connection between humans
and nature located at the “core of the mind” (1978).
According to Theodore Roszak the ecology movement today is poorly equipped
to bring about significant change in our relationship with the environment,
because it relies on fear and guilt, extrinsic factors, in its efforts
to motivate individuals to change rather than desire and interest, intrinsic
factors. The answer lies in a blending of self and planet:
Ecopsychology holds that there
is a synergistic interplay between planetary and personal well-being.
The term "synergy" is chosen deliberately for its traditional
theological connotation, which once taught that the human and divine
are cooperatively linked in the quest for salvation. The contemporary
ecological translation of the term might be: the needs of the planet
are the needs of the person, the rights of the person are the rights
of the planet. (Roszak 1992)
In addition to a blending of identities,
Roszak also argues that a shift in attention must occur:
What the modern cultural environment
has required of us is an enormous extroversion of attention and energy
for the purpose of reshaping the Earth into a global industrial economy.
For two centuries we have been subordinating the planet and our deepest
personal needs to that project. This great act of collective alienation,
I have suggested, lies at the root of both the environmental crisis
and individual neurosis. In some way, at some point, a change
of direction, a therapeutic turning inward, had to take place within
a culture as maniacally driven as ours has been by the need to achieve
and conquer." (1988)
Although it carries much folk wisdom,
ecopsychology lacks any substantial grounding in the discipline of psychology
and is often confused, in both Roszak’s writings and public perception,
with psychiatry, pop psychology, and various New Age practices.
Joseph Reser challenges social psychologists in particular to develop
and revive the field of ecopsychology with more dynamic constructions
of the self as a step towards understanding how self-construal and environmental
stewardship are related. "...what is needed is a cogent analysis
of how individual behaviour interfaces with global and localized environmental
problems, and an adequate, multilevel assessment of the determinants
of individual and collective behaviour." (1995).
An integration of existing psychological
frameworks of the 'self,' Terror Management Theory, and ecopsychology
presents the beginnings of a useful construction of the self that can
be applied to ecopsychology. The universal fear and denial of
death, the impetus for the disconnect between self and body, must be
reconciled in order for self-body-planet to merge. This split
between body and self as a result of fear of one’s mortality is echoed
in the difficulty of marketing ecological burials to the public.
"There's a cultural barrier to green burial in mainstream culture,"
says Kim Sorvig, a landscape architect at the University of New Mexico
who serves as an advisor to the Green Burial Council. "We have
a detachment or denial about people dying. You can go your entire life
and never be confronted with the actual facts of death." Sorvig
says planning for conservation burial can change the way people view
their own deaths, and thus their lives. “People are depriving themselves
of important psychological or spiritual connections by playing along
with the idea of death embedded in the conventional culture. This
offers great potential for engaging people now and helping them connect
with the cycle of birth and death as a part of human ecology -- it's
a very meaningful use of the earth"
N=1=0=Infinity proposes a possible
model of the self-body-environment understood through the medium of
death.
FEMA Trailer Project: An Eco-social
Approach to Understanding the Problem, A Transformation
"We will not ever use trailers
again," FEMA Director David Paulison, at a press conference in New
Orleans with Center for Disease Control Director Julie Gerberding, on
Thursday, Feb 14, 2008
Just before and after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of the United States in late August 2005, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) purchased 143,752 travel trailers and mobile homes largely through no-bid contracts, at an average of $18,620 each with a total cost of $2.7 billion. Between 90,000 and 120,000 units were occupied by storm victims across Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, leaving a surplus of approximately 8,420 brand new, fully furnished, never-used mobile homes. As a result of this surplus and the return of used FEMA trailers, FEMA had 60,000 trailers in storage nationwide, sitting in rented parking lots as of early 2007. Months after FEMA deployed the travel trailers in 2005, some residents began to complain of respiratory problems associated with formaldehyde off-gassing in the trailer. Moreover, social ills plague trailer communities—mental health problems are significantly higher in FEMA communities than in other areas in the Gulf Coast.