Please submit any files you might want me to have!
Key Terms:
RBMK Reactor
ARS (acute radiation syndrome): Symptoms include weakness, disorientation, headaches, and vomiting.
Roentgen (defunct measurement of radiation exposure) >> Rem or Sieverts
From p. 100 of Life Exposed:
Episode 1 shows the exposure of both groups of people, but we learn that the dosimeters are either not available or limited to a lower range of sensitivity.
What are your emotional reactions to seeing these events dramatized?
What are the questions you want to see answered?
What would you do, both knowing what we know now, and what would you have done if you knew exactly as little as the characters do?
www.duolingo.com/classroom/sxxayr
Consider joining this Duolingo class for Japanese Study. You can learn the katakana system in one semester and then be able to read all of the sound effects in the manga, or you can go further.
This site will teach you Kanji in about two years.
The First of the Required Manga: Lepage, Emmanuel. Springtime in Chernobyl. IDW, 2019.
Required reading in the near future: make sure you have it (or digital access at least). We will discuss this manga specifically on February 28th.
Alexievich, Svetlana. Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Disaster. Picador. 2006.
The basis of much of the show: The prologue is most relevant, but will be a spoiler. Feel free to read random snippets now.
Higginbotham, Adam, and Jacques Roy. Midnight in Chernobyl: the untold story
of the world's greatest nuclear disaster. 2019.
For the most context: While not required reading, this will answer almost all of your questions. It will be referenced frequently during the next few lectures
You may read these at home or focus on them in section. These are recommended, not required. For even more, see the sources in the footnotes of the summary and slides.
Voices From Chernobyl pp. 180-185 Valentine Aleksevich Borisevich on how they discovered the disaster had happened. I recommend you read the full story, perhaps in discussion section. Also see the prologue (pp. 5-23) For Lyudmila and Vasily's story (but reading the whole thing will give away the end of her story).
Midnight in Chernobyl:
Chapter 2 Alpha, Beta, and Gamma is a revelation of science writing and highly recommended for anyone wanting to know more about the science of nuclear reactors and radiation
For more on Bryukhanov and the way Chernobyl was built, see chapter 1.
For more on the firefighters see pp.58-59.
For more on RBMK design: See pp. 60-6.
Details of the safety test: p. 75.
For more on Dyatlov see pp. 76-78, and p. 80.
Introduction to Legasov: pp. 119-122
On the meeting of Scherbina and Legasov: p.126.
The miniseries' scripts can be found on the Chernobyl resources page, as can the podcasts. Episodes 1 and 2 are recommended.
These are suggestions for finishing the required reading in a timely manner, of course you can cram it all in at the last minute, or read reactively (after the lecture that is).
Springtime in Chernobyl is 161 pages. If you want to break it up evenly, read to page 48 by next week, which is a bit more than 40 pages in, but where there is a natural pause in the story. In general, if you read 40ish pages a week you will finish the Manga by Week 7, 2/28, when we will discuss the manga in class and section.
風の谷のナウシカ 漫画 (マンガ) For Nausicaä the manga, make sure you have access to a digital copy or a print copy. It is seven volumes and 1104 pages. Not only is this required, but you will be making a life-alteringly bad, regrettable mistake if you skip this manga. Binge, plan, or procrastinate, the choice is yours, but to read in evenly spaced amounts by volume, aim to read a volume a week starting next week. Note that volumes six and seven are longer than the rest, so you could start now and break the last volume into two.