On June 1, Dr. Hamilton Bean returned to the role of INTS program Director after serving as Interim Chair of the Department of Communication during the spring 2021 semester. He is looking forward to re-engaging with the INTS program, which he has led since July 2015. He greatly thanks Assistant Director, Dr. Alison Shah, for administering the program during the spring term. 

On June 1, he also began a four-month Visiting Professorship at Kyoto University’s Disaster Prevention Research Institute (DPRI). 

As recently reported on by Lisa Dicksteen for the Communication Department: 

Hamilton is leading multiple international projects including the “U.S.-Japan Expert Workshop: Improving Mobile Public Alert and Warning Globally”, which is supported by a grant from the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership. In addition, he is exploring public alert and warning systems in response to “Natech” (natural hazard-induced technological disasters). This work includes conducting activities in support of the Integrated Disaster Risk Management Society’s 11th international conference and seeking Scopus indexing for and serving as guest editor of the Journal of Integrated Disaster Risk Management. 

These were not Hamilton’s first academic forays into Japan. 

• After graduating from the University of New Mexico in 1996, he spent 15-months as an English teacher in Wakayama Prefecture. 
• In 2018, he led a CU Denver Global Study program through Western Japan. 
• During his 2019 sabbatical, he was Guest Researcher DPRI.

In his current tenure there, Hamilton interacts with a group of international researchers and graduate students from Japan, China, India, France, Greece, Colombia, and elsewhere. Although his office at DPRI is surrounded by the offices of engineers and physical science researchers, many of which have hazard materials signs prominently displayed as evidence of their majority focus on hard science research, Hamilton has found an openness to learning about and supporting social scientific and humanistic research. For example, Hamilton’s sponsor, Dr. Ana Maria Cruz, is leading a project exploring the role of “happiness” in disaster response, resilience, and renewal. 

As community engagement is a major focus of DPRI’s researchers, Hamilton has already participated in a research trip to Higashimiyoshi on the island of Shikoku, where the local community is working with DPRI-affiliated researchers to foster collaborative approaches to economic and cultural protection and revitalization, including disaster risk management and prevention. 

Photo caption: On June 19, 2021, Hamilton and local community members participated in the inaugural Okusu Seminar in Higashimiyoshi.