Hartwick’s response to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami
As Hartwick College prepares for the upcoming Babcock Lecture featuring “Wave” author and tsunami survivor Sonali Deraniyagala, the event offers an opportunity to recall how members of the Hartwick community responded to the devastating 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami.
When the tsunami struck Sri Lanka on Dec. 26, 2004, Hartwick Professor of Political Science Neil DeVotta and his wife, anthropologist Sandya Hewamanne, were conducting research in the country. They were staying at a guesthouse two kilometers inland when the tsunami struck. Afterward, they volunteered to deliver aid to some of the hardest-hit areas and co-authored a report. DeVotta later worked with Hartwick students who organized a Tsunami Response Fund, which sent donations to two Sri Lankan fishing villages with which he was connected.
Hartwick’s 2017 commencement speaker, Hilary Duffy ’91, also witnessed the aftermath firsthand. Shortly after the disaster, Duffy traveled to Sri Lanka, Southeast India, the Andaman Islands and Banda Aceh, Indonesia, as a documentary photographer on an assessment trip with a nongovernmental organization focused on emergency medical relief and long-term recovery assistance.
Beginning around Sept. 25, an exhibit of photographs by former Hartwick trustee Roy Rowan, who was a foreign correspondent, writer and editor for Life, Time and Fortune, will be displayed on the fourth floor of Stevens-German Library in Yager Hall. The exhibit features Rowan’s photographs of flooding in 1940s China as part of a broader look at the devastation caused by large-scale water events.
A Hilltops front page article describing Professor DeVotta’s lecture on campus. DeVotta went on to incorporate his experience into his scholarly work, including a 2005 article he published in the journal Civil Wars titled “Civil Society and Non-Governmental Organizations in Sri Lanka: Peacemakers or Parasites?” In that article DeVotta asserted that most NGOs’ work was beneficial to Sri Lankans, especially after the tsunami.
An ad from the Hilltops inviting Hartwick students to participate in the tsunami relief effort.
Professor DeVotta and his wife Sandya Hewamanne were on the cover of The Wick in the spring issue following the tsunami. They contributed a 5-page article including several photographs.
Also from The Wick, an image and description of Hartwick’s Tsunami Response Fund, organized by students to raise money and to increase awareness on campus about the tragedy.
An image, published in The Wick, of Professor DeVotta in Sri Lanka while he was volunteering to aid disaster victims.
An image of Hilary Duffy ’91 that accompanied The Wick article, 2013, about seven inspiring Hartwick alumni who work internationally.
An image from Hilltops of Duffy as a second-year Hartwick student.
An image of Hilary Duffy ’91 speaking during 2017 Commencement.
Photos are part of the collection in Hartwick College Paul F. Cooper, Jr. Archives.
