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How to Get to Know Communities and Cultures: Methods for Remediation, Removal, and Redevelopment Projects
Citation:
Maxwell, K. AND B. Kiessling. How to Get to Know Communities and Cultures: Methods for Remediation, Removal, and Redevelopment Projects. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-21/291, 2021.
Impact/Purpose:
Remediation, time-critical and non-time critical removals, and redevelopment of contaminated or potentially contaminated sites require interactions with diverse communities. Building relationships and community engagement, and community involvement are important components of this work. To do so, cleanup practitioners need to get to know communities, cultures, and affected populations near contaminated sites. This report details an anthropologically-informed methodology for getting to know community characteristics to carry out culturally informed cleanups. It is based on interview and survey data, and an analysis of EPA materials on this topic. It contains an explanation of how culture relates to cleanups, key community characteristics, and steps to take to gather and analyze quantitative and qualitative data sources to get to know communities. This methodology may be of interest to EPA, state, or Tribal environmental agency personnel who do remediation and removal work as part of Superfund, brownfields, emergency response, or other contaminated sites. It is intended to be used flexibly, and includes pointers for prioritizing steps and sources depending on the situation and on planning for long term cultural learning.
Description:
This report provides a social science-based methodology for learning about key characteristics and constituencies of communities, cultures, and affected populations near contaminated sites. Learning about communities supports building relationships and trust, and conducting culturally-informed cleanups. This methodology can be used as a basis for generating knowledge for site characterization and assessment, risk communication, the development of a Community Involvement Plan, and outreach and engagement with local social actors and organizations. It is relevant for a variety of contaminated site situations such as Superfund, environmental emergencies, and brownfields. It compiles practices and lessons learned based upon primary research, including interviews and surveys with EPA cleanup practitioners, and synthesizes social scientific literature and EPA materials on this topic. The report summarizes anthropological analysis of communities and cultures, explains key community and cultural characteristics relevant to cleanups, provides steps and information sources for Figuring Out Who Lives Here, discusses how cleanup situations might affect which steps and sources would be most appropriate, and presents qualitative data management and analysis techniques. This report covers a period from February 2017 to May, 2021.