@article {bnh-7341, title = {A Culture of Burning: Social-Ecological Memory, Social Learning and Adaptation in Australian Volunteer Fire Brigades}, journal = {Society and Natural Resources}, year = {2020}, month = {09/2020}, abstract = {

While Australian government agencies are increasingly emphasizing the need to {\textquotedblleft}build community resilience{\textquotedblright} to bushfires, communities in many rural landscapes have a strong history of actively managing fire risk, in particular through involvement in volunteer fire brigades. This paper explores social-ecological memory, social learning, and adaptation in volunteer Country Fire Authority brigades in western Victoria, specifically in the context of planned burning of strategic roadside fire breaks. It examines the relationships between local knowledge, narratives and practices of burning and how these shape volunteer identities, embodying {\textquotedblleft}shared responsibility{\textquotedblright}. Findings show that participation in roadside burning is critical for supporting social learning and ongoing community engagement in fire management. However, changing land uses, social demographics and regulatory processes are negatively impacting local volunteer capacities. While brigades have responded by re-organizing their practices, questions remain as to what extent this constitutes adaptation or transformation connecting to broader landscape-level risk management.

}, keywords = {adaptation, Bushfire, community-based fire management, planned burning, resilience, volunteering}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1080/08941920.2020.1819494}, url = {https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08941920.2020.1819494}, author = {Sarah Dickson-Hoyle and Ruth Beilin and Karen Reid} } @article {bnh-1814, title = {It{\textquoteright}s not a {\textquoteleft}thing{\textquoteright} but a {\textquoteleft}place{\textquoteright}: reconceptualising {\textquoteleft}assets{\textquoteright} in the context of fire risk landscapes}, journal = {International Journal of Wildland Fire}, volume = {24}, year = {2015}, month = {12/2014}, pages = {130-137}, type = {Journal}, chapter = {130}, abstract = {

At a national policy level, Australian governments have embraced the notion of shared responsibility between agencies and communities for disaster resilience, including bushfire. Emergency management agencies take an asset-based approach to management based on an assumption that valued places can be quantified by cataloguing individual {\textquoteleft}things{\textquoteright} in the landscape. Implicit in shared responsibility, however, is incorporation of local knowledge of landscape and risk into planning. This already difficult task can be made more complex as local constructions of risk in the landscape sometimes appear at odds with management agency perspectives. This research examined local constructions of bushfire risk in two contrasting Australian landscapes {\textendash} one semi-rural, one peri-urban. The results suggest that local ecological knowledge arises from interactions between people, the landscape and objects (e.g. flora and fauna) in the landscape. Place meanings transcend individual {\textquoteleft}things{\textquoteright}, emerging instead from experience of the whole landscape, both social and ecological and at multiple scales. We argue therefore, that understanding bushfire cannot be segregated from wider social and ecological processes at a landscape level. Shared responsibility will involve respectful and meaningful engagement between agencies and landholders in collaborative planning to ensure local knowledge informs asset-based management.

}, doi = {10.1071/WF14035}, url = {http://www.publish.csiro.au/nid/114/paper/WF14035.htm}, author = {Ruth Beilin and Karen Reid} } @article {bnh-1835, title = {Making the landscape {\textquotedblleft}home{\textquotedblright}: Narratives of bushfire and place in Australia}, journal = {Geoforum}, volume = {58}, year = {2015}, month = {01/2015}, pages = {95-103}, chapter = {95}, abstract = {

This study investigated how the meaning of {\textquoteleft}home{\textquoteright} influences the social construction of bushfire in two Australian communities at high risk. An increasing number of Australians are living in proximity to areas of high bushfire risk due to climate, vegetation and demographic changes. Land and Fire Management Agencies recognise an urgent need to understand what motivates residents to take action to mitigate bushfire risk, and individual decisions whether or not to evacuate when bushfire is imminent. In bushfire policy and management, the home is considered to be synonymous with the house and associated built structures. Using a combination of visual and ethnographic research methods, we {\textquoteleft}mapped{\textquoteright} residents{\textquoteright} understanding of {\textquoteleft}home{\textquoteright}. The findings suggest that the concept of {\textquoteleft}home{\textquoteright} embraces more than the private spaces of house and garden. Landscape practices such as gardening with indigenous plant species, ecological restoration, and habitual walking extend the home territory beyond the house and garden and into public landscapes. Physical elements of the landscape such as mountains and locally significant species of trees form part of the {\textquoteleft}imaginary{\textquoteright} of home. These findings are important to the on-going study of the meaning of home. The implications are also significant for land and bushfire managers as they suggest that community education programs that focus solely on the house may fail to connect with people{\textquoteright}s wider sense of home in the landscape.

}, doi = {doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.10.005}, url = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016718514002218}, author = {Karen Reid and Ruth Beilin} } @article {BF-4308, title = {Putting {\textquoteleft}it{\textquoteright} together: mapping the narratives of bushfire and place in two Australian landscapes - final report for the Social construction of fuels in the interface 2 project}, year = {2014}, month = {2014}, abstract = {The landscape means different things to different people and these {\textquoteleft}social constructions{\textquoteright} strongly influence what people value in landscapes and how they think about management. Community landscape values may not always correspond with the assets that fire management agencies prioritise for protection. This pilot research project aimed to (1) understand the underlying social and ecological values people associate with the landscape, and (2) investigate how understanding the interface between scientific-ecological and local-intuitive knowledge can contribute to fire management. Taking a {\textquotedblleft}place-mapping{\textquotedblright} approach, we interviewed residents in two contrasting Australian landscapes {\textendash} the Adelaide Hills and the Southern Grampians. Research participants were asked to {\textquoteleft}mud map{\textquoteright} their social and ecological landscapes at local and regional scales. Key findings from the research were: There is little evidence of an {\textquoteleft}information deficit{\textquoteright} about the risk of bushfire among residents. Many however expect to be taken surprised by fire (local ignition, low risk day) and therefore construct multiple fire plans to suit multiple scenarios. Home-making practices (gardening, planting indigenous species, walking the landscape creating a home-territory) extend the sense of {\textquotedblleft}home{\textquotedblright} into the landscape. Being at home during a fire is therefore about protecting values greater than the house. There is however a tension between homeowner responsibility for mitigation before a fire and lack of control during a fire. The ways people order and prioritise their memory of fire is important. Memory may be a forward construct that helps people deal with future risk. Mapping as a method seems to trigger a memory response that helps people connect intuitive and rational ways of knowing about fire; they connect their social and ecological (biophysical) worlds in this process. These findings should assist managers to assess the fire safety message and the findings support and create new ways to engage with local communities. }, author = {Ruth Beilin and Karen Reid} } @proceedings {BF-3758, title = {Ecological and social {\textquotedblleft}place{\textquotedblright} mapping to assist bushfire management and research}, year = {2012}, pages = {127-131}, abstract = {strategy implies that individual assets and threats in the landscape can be identified and that planning can proceed on that basis. The question that arises however is who decides what is an asset and what is a threat when multiple values are being managed within multiple management regimes. We argue that bushfire knowledge encompasses technical constructs based on for example, the science of fire ecology or fire danger indices; and social constructs grounded in assumptions about how different types of landscapes should be managed (e.g. for biodiversity, amenity or production). Fire management agencies prioritize scientific-technical solutions to wildfire prediction and control. Consequently, the {\textquoteleft}social{\textquoteright} revolves around one-way knowledge transfer, communicating the science to people living in fire-prone communities. We apply resilience thinking to bushfire research by focusing on complex and interdependent social and ecological systems as linked domains of understanding. Using the metaphor of {\textquoteleft}landscape{\textquoteright} as the location where social and ecological systems are entwined (e.g. Meinig 1979), we explore bushfire as a physical reality comprised of topographies, and ecological systems; and as a social process involving practices of negotiation and interpretation that shape landscape management. ...}, url = {http://www.iawfonline.org/pdf/3rd\%20Human\%20Dimensions\%20Conference\%20Proceedings\%20-\%20FINAL.pdf}, author = {Karen Reid and Ruth Beilin} }