Healing from trauma in post-disaster places? Placemaking, Machizukuri and the Role of Cultural Events in Post- Disaster Recovery

Using cultural events to reshape narratives and imaginaries in places hit by disasters is not uncommon. In addition to their economic benefits, cultural events can be used as an essential tool for placemaking, offering possibilities for local communities to make sense of traumatic pasts, reimagine their future, and generate a sense of place through connections between people, whether locals or non- locals. This chapter investigates how and in what ways the locals involved in the Reborn Art Festival (RAF) in Ishinomaki, Japan, directly or indirectly utilize the festival to negotiate trauma and placemaking processes after the triple disaster which took place on 11 March 2011.