Doctoral Dissertation Research: Workers' Perceptions of Health-Risk Exposure in an Extractive Industry

科学家已经证明，在美国，水力压裂开采页岩油和天然气会使工人暴露在不安全水平的可吸入结晶二氧化硅中，这种粉尘会导致身体虚弱和致命的肺部疾病，引发了人们对工人健康和这个不断扩大的行业的劳动过程的质疑。该项目考察了随着监管变化的展开，影响工人对二氧化硅暴露的看法的因素。该研究分析了页岩能源工人在性别社会关系和时空灵活性的背景下看待这种职业健康危害的方式，这是他们工作的特点，并研究了它如何与限制接触二氧化硅的拟议联邦法规相交叉。这项研究为日益增长的页岩气研究提供了一个新的视角，迄今为止，页岩气研究一直强调对社区经济和环境影响的认识。此外，它还推动了健康地理学的工作，以检查性别和地理过程对健康观念的影响。限制职业接触结晶二氧化硅的拟议法规将影响从事水力压裂的公司和工人；因此，该研究将与政府、工业、社区组织和有组织的劳工的利益相关者合作，提供及时的分析，并将产生与水力压裂作业中结晶二氧化硅相关的报告、培训和宣传材料。本项目利用女权主义和健康地理学中开发的理论工具，分析了在页岩气行业中形成工人对二氧化硅暴露的健康感知的过程，以评估当前的监管建议。其目的是了解有关工人二氧化硅暴露的监管和行业话语如何影响工人对二氧化硅暴露和缓解做法的看法，劳动过程如何影响工人对二氧化硅暴露和缓解做法的看法，最后，工作之外的社会关系，特别是家庭关系如何影响工人对二氧化硅暴露和缓解做法的看法。该研究主要在宾夕法尼亚州的Williamsport进行，该地区是Marcellus页岩地区的钻井活动中心，除了制度分析和参与者观察外，还将通过对工人、家庭成员、政府和行业代表的半结构化访谈来完成。这些方法将建立在初步研究的基础上，初步研究确定了建立安全和健康工作场所做法的监管努力、对工作场所健康和安全的规范化文化态度以及从事采掘工作的工人所感受到的压力和义务之间的矛盾。该项目采用的女权主义方法论推进了定性研究，特别是人种学研究，因为它关注日常经验，使其准备好检查结构规范和个人身份之间的矛盾，在某些情况下，对个人产生更大的风险。

Scientists have shown that hydraulic fracturing to extract shale oil and gas in the United States can expose workers to unsafe levels of respirable crystalline silica, a dust that can cause debilitating and deadly lung diseases, raising questions about workers' health and the labor process in this expanding industry. This project examines factors shaping workers' perceptions of their silica exposure as regulatory change unfolds. The study analyzes the ways shale energy workers perceive this occupational health hazard in the context of the gendered social relations and spatio-temporal flexibility that characterizes their work to examine how it intersects with proposed federal regulation that would limit exposure to silica. This study contributes a new perspective to the growing shale gas scholarship, which to date has emphasized perceptions of community economic and environmental impacts. Further, it advances efforts within health geography to examine gendered and geographic processes mediating perceptions of health. Proposed regulations to limit occupational exposure to crystalline silica will impact companies and workers engaged in hydraulic fracturing; thus, this study will provide timely analysis derived collaboratively with stakeholders in government, industry, community organizations, and organized labor and will result in reports, and training and awareness materials related to crystalline silica in hydraulic fracturing operations.This project analyzes processes that shape workers' health perception of silica exposure in the shale gas industry using theoretical tools developed in feminist and health geography to evaluate current regulatory proposals. It aims to understand how regulatory and industry discourses about workers' silica exposure affect how workers perceive silica exposure and practice mitigation, how the labor process affects how workers perceive silica exposure and practice mitigation and finally, how social relations outside of work, in particular those of the family, affect how workers perceive silica exposure and practice mitigation. Conducted primarily from Williamsport, Pennsylvania, a hub of drilling activity in the Marcellus Shale region, this research will be completed through semi-structured interviews with workers, family members, and government and industry representatives, in addition to institutional analysis, and participant observation. These methods will build upon preliminary research that has identified contradictions among regulatory efforts to establish safe and healthy workplace practices, normalized cultural attitudes about workplace health and safety, and the pressures and obligations felt by workers engaged in extractive work. The feminist methodological approach taken by this project advances qualitative, and specifically ethnographic research, as its focus on everyday experience makes it poised to examine contradictions between structural norms and individuals' identities that, in some instances, produce greater risk to individuals.