Jenny Donovan – författare

Designing to Heal explores what happens to communities that have suffered disasters, either natural or man-made, and what planners and urban designers can do to give the affected communities the best possible chance of recovery. It examines the relationship that people have with their surroundings and the profound disruption to people''s lives that can occur when that relationship is violently changed; when the familiar settings for their lives are destroyed and family, friends and neighbours are displaced, incapacitated or killed.

The book offers a model of the healing process, outlining the emotional journey that people go on as they struggle to rebuild their lives. It outlines the characteristics of the built environment that may facilitate people to travel as smoothly as possible down this road to recovery and suggests elements of the design process that can help achieve this goal. Designing to Heal highlights the importance of thinking about urban design as a way of nurturing hope and creating the optimal conditions to achieve social objectives.

The experiences we enjoy, endure, or miss out on are influenced by what our surroundings allow and invite us to do. Just like our food diet, our experience diet influences our health and so our chances of finding happiness and fulfilling our potential. A healthy experience diet offers inspiration, reassurance, delight, and play. It nurtures physical, cognitive, and emotional health, builds resilience, and fosters confidence and self-esteem. An unhealthy experience diet lacks these things and consigns people to lives diminished in quantity and quality. Recipes for Urban Happiness offers an innovative way of looking at the relationship between people and place and redefines what good urban design is. The book outlines what designers and non-designers can do to create urban places where nurturing behaviours are both possible and preferable. Recipes for Urban Happiness will be relevant to public health, community development, and design practitioners, as well as students and academics.

The experiences we enjoy, endure, or miss out on are influenced by what our surroundings allow and invite us to do. Just like our food diet, our experience diet influences our health and so our chances of finding happiness and fulfilling our potential. A healthy experience diet offers inspiration, reassurance, delight, and play. It nurtures physical, cognitive, and emotional health, builds resilience, and fosters confidence and self-esteem. An unhealthy experience diet lacks these things and consigns people to lives diminished in quantity and quality. Recipes for Urban Happiness offers an innovative way of looking at the relationship between people and place and redefines what good urban design is. The book outlines what designers and non-designers can do to create urban places where nurturing behaviours are both possible and preferable. Recipes for Urban Happiness will be relevant to public health, community development, and design practitioners, as well as students and academics.

Community Engagement in Post-Disaster Recovery reflects a wide array of practical experiences in working with disaster-affected communities internationally. It demonstrates that widely held assumptions about the benefits of community consultation and engagement in disaster recovery work need to be examined more critically because poorly conceived and hastily implemented community engagement strategies have sometimes exacerbated divisions within affected communities and/or resulted in ineffective use of aid funding. It is equally demonstrated that well-crafted, creative and thoughtful programming is possible.

The wide collection of case studies of practical experience from around the world is presented to help establish ways of working with communities experiencing great challenges. The book offers practical suggestions on how to give more substance to the rhetoric of community consultation and engagement in these areas of work. It suggests the need to work with a dynamic understanding of community formation that is particularly relevant when people experience unforeseen challenges and traumatic experiences. This title interrogates the concept of community through an extensive review of the literature and explores the ways of working with communities in transition and particularly in their recovery phases through an array of case studies in a range of socioeconomic and political contexts.

Focused on the concept of community in post-disaster recovery solutions—an aspect which has received little critical interrogation in the literature—this book will be a valuable resource to students and scholars in disaster management as well as humanitarian agencies.

Community Engagement in Post-Disaster Recovery reflects a wide array of practical experiences in working with disaster-affected communities internationally. It demonstrates that widely held assumptions about the benefits of community consultation and engagement in disaster recovery work need to be examined more critically because poorly conceived and hastily implemented community engagement strategies have sometimes exacerbated divisions within affected communities and/or resulted in ineffective use of aid funding. It is equally demonstrated that well-crafted, creative and thoughtful programming is possible.

The wide collection of case studies of practical experience from around the world is presented to help establish ways of working with communities experiencing great challenges. The book offers practical suggestions on how to give more substance to the rhetoric of community consultation and engagement in these areas of work. It suggests the need to work with a dynamic understanding of community formation that is particularly relevant when people experience unforeseen challenges and traumatic experiences. This title interrogates the concept of community through an extensive review of the literature and explores the ways of working with communities in transition and particularly in their recovery phases through an array of case studies in a range of socioeconomic and political contexts.

Focused on the concept of community in post-disaster recovery solutions—an aspect which has received little critical interrogation in the literature—this book will be a valuable resource to students and scholars in disaster management as well as humanitarian agencies.

Designing the Compassionate City outlines an approach to urban design that is centred on an explicit recognition of the inherent dignity of all people. It suggests that whether we thrive or decline—as individuals or as a community—is dependent on our ability to fulfil the full spectrum of our needs. This book considers how our surroundings help or hinder us from meeting these needs by influencing both what we can do and what we want to do; either inspiring us to lead healthy, fulfilled lives or consigning us to diminished lives tainted by ill health and unfulfilled potential.

Designing the Compassionate City looks at how those who participate in designing towns and cities can collaborate with those who live in them to create places that help people to accumulate the life lessons, experiences and achievements, as well as forge the connections to meet their needs, to thrive and to fulfil their potential. The book explores a number of inspiring case studies that have sought to meet this challenge and examines what has worked and what hasn’t. From this, some conclusions are drawn about how we can all participate in creating places that leave a lasting legacy of empowerment and commitment to nurturing one another. It is essential reading for students and practitioners designing happier, healthier places.