SCOTT GABRIEL KNOWLES, PHD

Scott Gabriel Knowles is a historian of disaster worldwide. He focuses on the historical processes that make disasters possible, and the application of history to reduce future disasters. Since March of 2020 Knowles has hosted #COVIDCalls every weekday, a live podcast discussion of the COVID-19 pandemic. He is publication series co-editor (with Kim Fortun) of “Critical Studies in Risk and Disaster” with the University of Pennsylvania Press.

He was (2019) a research fellow of the Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science and Technology, NOVA University of Lisbon. He has previously been a research fellow or visiting faculty member of CIGIDEN/Catolica Chile (2018), the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (2016), the Rachel Carson Center (2016), and the University of Tokyo (2015).

His work on the history of risk and disaster has appeared in the Natural Hazards Observer, History and Technology, Journal of Policy History, American Scientist, Technology and Culture, and Engineering Studies—he has also written for the The Hankyoreh, New York Times, Washington Post, Huffington Post, Slate, Conservation Magazine, U.S. News and World Report, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Hill. Knowles is completing two new books: The United States of Disaster; and, Slow Disaster.