Call for Multilingual Inclusiveness in Science and Disaster Research and Contexts Studies Journal of Disaster Studies

Multilingualism in science is crucial for stimulating knowledge production, circulation, and dissemination. It enriches disciplinary frames and perspectives on societal issues, reflecting the cultures and ontologies of scientific communities and their engagement with local agendas. It is also a key issue of social justice and linguistic human rights because it expands the participation and dialogue among diverse communities of scientists and influences stakeholders who use science to address urgent global issues. Systematic and sustained implementation of multilingual scholarly communication and peer-reviewed publishing is cumbersome for journal management platforms, research teams, and editorial boards. Organizational and technical tasks usually override investment in diversifying frames and perspectives in journals, books, and conferences. Despite critiques of monolingualism and serious commitments to disseminate research output across different geographies, disaster research has continued to be conceptualized and communicated primarily in English. There is an enormous challenge in revising the categories that have shaped disaster management and communication, as well as standard practices of translation and interpretation that have magnified the vulnerability experienced by ethnic minorities and non–English speaking groups. This Research Note attempts to couple current views on multilingualism in science and disaster studies and proposes the first statement of the Journal of Disaster Studies (JDS) on inclusive multilingualism. The JDS Editorial Collective hopes this initiative will foster further investment in multilingualism across disaster research and publishing.