Waves Amidst War: Intercultural Challenges While Training Volunteers to Respond to the Psychosocial Needs of Sri Lankan Tsunami Survivors

This paper describes workshops offered in Sri Lanka to volunteers from 4 villages affected by the Asian tsunami to train them in basic psychosocial skills for working with survivors, 6 months after the tsunami struck. Questions about the appropriateness and viability of applying Western conceptions of disaster mental health responses to an ethnically diverse South Asian country are raised and intercultural challenges explored. The concept of the social ecology of natural disaster is presented and applied to Sri Lanka, an economically poor country recovering from a tsunami amidst ongoing lethal ethnic conflict. The efficacy of the trainings and suggestions for future interventions are considered.