DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Breathing Uncertainty: Risk, Exposure, and Air Pollution Management in Mongolia's Capital City

这篇论文的研究项目将考察蒙古最大城市乌兰巴托的城市居民如何在与空气污染控制的互动中发展、争论和运用关于风险的知识。该项目的重点是在新的空气质量监测设备和节能炉技术上进行巨额投资。这笔投资是行业、国家和公民改善乌兰巴托城市生活条件的长期、持续承诺的一部分，乌兰巴托的污染物水平远远超过国际可接受的标准。这个项目将从民族志的角度考察以下两个研究问题。专家如何与空气污染缓解技术互动，以产生关于风险和暴露的知识？作为新炉具技术的接受者，最容易受到空气污染影响的市民是如何产生风险的想法的？调查员将与科学家和项目协调员分享具体发现，以帮助改进技术方法，并促进科学领域、私营部门和贫民窟社区之间更强有力的伙伴关系。她还将发表演讲，编写课程材料，并进行会议和公共活动演讲，以激励未来几代城市环境健康领域的当地学者。最后，她将分享她的研究成果，帮助地区社区让公民参与做出关于如何保护他们的健康免受空气污染影响的明智决定。技术总结这项研究将技术与风险形成的社会过程进行对话。该项目的目标是使医学人类学能够更好地理解小规模技术的涌入是如何与正在进行的全球卫生私有化交织在一起的。该项目还将通过调查特定地点和风险构建过程来增强社会科学中的风险概念，并将提供丰富的人种学报告，说明全球环境卫生干预措施如何影响脆弱的城市社区。为了实现这些目标，调查员将在乌兰巴托的炉子更换计划一个完整周期后进行为期12个月的研究。与其他关于风险和环境危害的研究不同，这项研究将通过与参与干预的关键科学家、私营公司和贫民窟居民接触，将日常生活的微观政治与宏观过程联系起来，阐明风险是如何构建、营销和体验的。通过突出科学过程的日常做法、节能炉灶的营销以及贫民窟社区的日常经验，该项目还将成为一个重要的案例，研究技术如何改变全球卫生状况。

General Audience Summary This dissertation research project will examine how urban residents develop, dispute and deploy knowledge about risk in interaction with air pollution controls In Ulaanbaatar, the largest city in Mongolia. The project focuses of on a colossal investment in new air quality surveillance devices and fuel-efficient stove technologies. The investment is a part of a long term, sustained commitment by industry, the state, and citizens to improve urban living conditions in Ulaanbaatar, where pollutant levels are far beyond internationally acceptable standards. This project will ethnographically examine the following two research questions. How do experts interact with air pollution mitigation technologies to produce knowledge about risk and exposure? As recipients of new stove technologies, how do citizens who are most vulnerable to air pollution produce ideas about risk? The investigator will share specific findings with scientists and project coordinators to help improve both technical methods and to foster stronger partnerships among scientific fields, the private sector, and slum communities. She will also give lectures, develop curriculum materials, and give conference and public-event presentations to inspire future generations of local scholars in the field of urban environmental health. Finally, she will share her research findings to help district communities to engage citizens in making informed decisions about how to protect their health against air pollution exposure.Technical Summary This research puts technologies in dialogue with the social processes of risk formation. The goal of the project is to expand enable medical anthropology to better understand how the influx of small-scale technologies is intertwined with the ongoing privatization of global health. The project will also enhance the concept of risk in social science by investigating specific sites and processes of risk construction, and it will provide a rich ethnographic account of how global environmental health interventions affect vulnerable, urban communities.To meet these goals the investigator will conduct research for 12 months following one full cycle of the stove-replacement program in Ulaanbaatar. Unlike other studies on risk and environmental hazards, this study will illuminate how risk is constructed, marketed, and experienced by connecting the micro-politics of everyday life with macro-scale process by engaging with key scientists, private companies and slum residents involved in the intervention. By highlighting the everyday practices of the scientific process, marketing of energy-efficient stoves, and daily experiences of slum communities, this project will also serve as an important case study of how technologies are changing the landscape of global health.