Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #116297

john Sullivan, NIEHS/PF&TA, NIEHS / sealy center for environmental health & medicine, university of texas medical branch @ galveston, 301 university blvd., SCEHM / NIEHS UTMB, Galveston, TX 77555-1071, 409-747-1246, josulliv@utmb.edu

Abstract: The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of Texas Medical Branch / Galveston created a Community Outreach & Education Program (COEP) to translate basic research in environmental toxicology into useful information for communities affected by toxic exposures. The COEP's Public Forum & Toxics Assistance Division (PF&TA) offers communities throughout the Gulf Coast petrochemical belt an opportunity to use Augusto Boal's Image Theater techniques and improvisation to analyze and develop toxicological concepts such as real and perceived ambient and occupational risk factors, exposure levels, exposure pathways, toxic dosages and related health effects, bio-availability, bio-accumulation and consequent body burdens, and to dramatize the significance of these factors within each community's unique context. Throughout the community workshop, image structures are used to create embodied representations of site-specific science, and as an ethnographic tool to demonstrate community risk perceptions, attitudes toward activist engagement and local social dynamics. These Images may illustrate a given community's wealth of resources or need for additional mobilization in response to environmental challenges. Images and improvisations also provide the basis for scenes that demonstrate how toxic exposures affect the lives of citizens. UTMB's PF&TA division has collaborated with communities from Corpus Christi to Baton Rouge, and worked extensively with the community-based Bucket Brigades.

PLEASE NOTE: The Community Forum & Toxics Assistance Division of UTMB's NIEHS Center strongly supports the national Bucket Brigade and would like to give our presentation with the other organizations who have submitted abstracts as part of this collaborative.

Learning Objectives: