Paper short abstract:

Chronicled in this paper is the cascade of emotions that survivors of disaster undergo. Further brought up are the nuances of pain of past, home, and place that the dispossessed suffer when the fabric of life unravels.

Paper long abstract:

On October 20, 1991 a spark from an old fire reignited and swept down the hills behind Oakland and Berkeley, California. Within four days it destroyed 3,356 homes and 456 apartments. The Oakland Firestorm remains the largest urban fire that the United States has ever witnessed. Twenty-five people died. Six thousand people were left homeless. I am one of the survivors. In the fire I lost my home, clothing, furniture, heirlooms, car, pets, twenty-five years of anthropological research, library, and all my writings. To describe the devastation both physical and psychological of this kind of loss is like trying to define eternity or infinity. The experience and its upshot changed not only my life but also my anthropology. This paper explores the chronicle of the emotions and affect I, and other survivors, of disaster undergo and brings up the nuances of pain, nostalgia (pain of past), ecalgia (pain of home), and topalgia (pain of place) the dispossessed suffer when the fabric of life unravels. Covered will be loss of cultural and physical surroundings, quotidian habit and sphere, legacy and expectation, and perceptual ambience.