This
book examines the dangers and the patterns of adaptation that emerge through
exposure to risk on a daily basis. By addressing the influence of environmental factors in Indian Ocean
World history, the collection reaches across the boundaries of the natural and
social sciences, presenting case-studies that deal with a diverse range of
natural hazards - fire in Madagascar, drought in India, cyclones and typhoons in
Oman, Australia and the Philippines, climatic variability, storms and flood in
Vietnam and the Philippines, and volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and tsunamis
in Indonesia. These chapters, written by leading international historians,
respond to a growing need to understand the ways in which natural hazards shape
social, economic and political development of the Indian Ocean World, a region
of the globe that is highly susceptible to the impacts of seismic activity,
extreme weather, and climate change.