Presentation Type
Oral Presentation - Campus Access Only
Category
Social Sciences/Humanities
Abstract/Artist Statement
Anaconda is a town located in southwest Montana. Anaconda was established as a smelting operation to process copper ore. It is now home to one of the largest Superfund sites in the United States. Since the Superfund designation in 1983, agencies, nonprofit organizations, and stakeholders have worked to implement cleanup strategies. Community resilience has become a focus of this site. Community resilience has been studied through various lenses, but broadly refers to how a community responds and copes with a perturbation. This research considers environmental, cultural, and political perturbations. It focuses on the changes and transitions the community has gone through, and how different decisions lead to more or less resilience. Specifically, this research is interested in how the community perceives its own resilience. Previous community resilience research has often not given enough attention to complex social dynamics, which is the aim of this research. Preliminary findings from interviews with stakeholders will be discussed which highlight themes of trust, risk, and identity related to resilience. These findings have the potential to answer larger questions for other communities, especially those with legacies of mining or contamination.
Mentor Name
Elizabeth Metcalf
Anaconda, Montana: From Smelting to Superfund
Anaconda is a town located in southwest Montana. Anaconda was established as a smelting operation to process copper ore. It is now home to one of the largest Superfund sites in the United States. Since the Superfund designation in 1983, agencies, nonprofit organizations, and stakeholders have worked to implement cleanup strategies. Community resilience has become a focus of this site. Community resilience has been studied through various lenses, but broadly refers to how a community responds and copes with a perturbation. This research considers environmental, cultural, and political perturbations. It focuses on the changes and transitions the community has gone through, and how different decisions lead to more or less resilience. Specifically, this research is interested in how the community perceives its own resilience. Previous community resilience research has often not given enough attention to complex social dynamics, which is the aim of this research. Preliminary findings from interviews with stakeholders will be discussed which highlight themes of trust, risk, and identity related to resilience. These findings have the potential to answer larger questions for other communities, especially those with legacies of mining or contamination.