防災教育と博物館  [in Japanese] Social education for the prevention of natural disasters in the museum  [in Japanese]

兵庫県南部地震を契機にして, 防災ならびに地盤構成・地下の様子など居住環境に対する地域住民の意識が急変した。防災教育の強化・推進に際しては, 非常時の対応, 被害の軽減策などと同時に, 自然災害の根底に横たわっている地学現象, さらには日本列島あるいは地域の自然の総合的理解の上に立った防災教育が必要である。本文では, 博物館設立準備室時代から実践してきた防災教育の一端を紹介し, とくに地震発生後, 「人と自然の博物館」が地元の博物館として何をしてきたかについて報告した。博物館の自然史部門ではどこの博物館でもなされている展示・普及教育に加え, 「人と自然の共生」に直結する多様な環境問題あるいはその背後に存在する地学現象や地学素材を意識し, 地域社会・地域住民の期待・要望が充分に反映されるような, そして地学関連分野の重要性・必要性を広くアッピールしていけるような博物館活動がこれまで以上に強く望まれる。

On January 17, 1995, a big earthquake, called "The Hyogo-ken Naubu Earthquake", with magnitude of 7.2 rocked the southern part of Hyogo Prefecture, west Japan. The earthquake caused the most disastrous damage in the last seven decades in Japan, killing more than 6,000 lives and leaving about 420,000 households completely and partially destroyed. Being responsible for dissemination about this earthquake, a special exhibition, titled "Learn the Hyogoken Nanbu Earth quake", was taken place from November, 1995 to March, 1996, in the Museum of Nature and Human Activities, Hyogo. I have been provided the prefectural people with opportunities to learn more, better and wider various kinds of natural disaster and their related problems. Any remarkable reactions had not been presented against my dissemination from prefectural people before outburst of the earthquake. Prefectural people's interests and demands for the museum had, however, changed increasingly and surprisingly after the catastrophic accident. They are thought to be largely influenced by the nationwide news coverage of several weeks immediately after the earthquakes. Their great concern in and around the earthquake had concentrated to the active faults distributed near the residence of the prefectural people. In this short paper, dissemination activities about natural disasters in the museum are introduced briefly, focalizing upon the present great earthquake disaster and reviewing the activities since preopening of the museum. Especially emphasized is indispensability and importance of the activities to which the matters of primary concern of every day-life in the field of the Earth Sciences and related ones are deeply reflected.