Southern Cultures: Katrina's America

Twenty years ago, Hurricane Katrina sent a storm surge into the Gulf of Mexico. When the levee system surrounding metropolitan New Orleans collapsed, hundreds of people died, tens of thousands of people lost their homes, and years of suffering and struggle followed. At the time, many people understood Katrina as an unprecedented disaster, or a catastrophe that could only occur on the underprivileged margins of American wealth and power. From today’s vantage, however, Katrina no longer looks like an exception. The two decades since the flood have brought more water, fire, and pandemic, surging racist violence, widening economic inequality, and seemingly irreconcilable political conflict. The past two decades have brought, too, emboldened community organizing, ambitious visions for addressing the climate crisis, and other creative efforts to build a more humane future. In all of these domains, Katrina does not appear to be retreating into the past so much as resounding in the future. It is increasingly clear that we live, today, in Katrina’s America.