The number of natural disasters is increasing dramatically at the present – and along with it, researchers’ interest in the subject. In this context, questions formulated within the area of Cultural Studies, precisely, have proven to be of particular importance. The occurrence of, or fear of, natural disasters has led to the development of complex cultural protection systems in traditional societies, and even more so, in modern societies. At the Ludwig Uhland Institute (LUI) for Historical and Cultural Anthropology, the discussion of natural disaster cultures has become a central topic of research, not in the least due to the participation in the Tübingen-based Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 923, “Threatened Order – Societies under Stress.” At the moment a number of dissertations are being published on that subject.
