Responding to Hard Times in the “Big Easy”: Meeting the Vocational Needs of Low‐Income African American New Orleans Residents

The already limited vocational prospects of low‐income African Americans in New Orleans were further devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill added to the devastation, highlighting the continued vulnerability of New Orleanians seeking employment. As a result, opportunities persist for vocational practitioners to lend their expertise. In this article, the post‐Katrina vocational situation of low‐income African American residents is conceptualized using Bronfenbrenner's (1977) ecological model. Furthermore, needed interventions are described at each level of this ecological model.     

Displacement and local linguistic practices: R‐lessness in post‐Katrina Greater New Orleans

Variable r‐lessness in New Orleans English is a salient linguistic feature tied to local place‐based identity. In this study, I examine rates of r‐lessness in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, which caused large‐scale displacement in the region. Participants come from the linguistically conservative suburb of Chalmette, where r‐lessness is more robust than in New Orleans proper. Participants’ connections to Chalmette were measured in two ways: (1) post‐Katrina location status, i.e. whether participants returned or relocated after the storm; (2) place orientation, captured via an ethnographically informed, multifaceted measure of stance and exposure to places outside of Chalmette. Analysis revealed that place orientation better predicts rates of r‐lessness than post‐Katrina location. I argue that the marked quality of r‐lessness makes it available for identity‐driven use to express a connection to Chalmette. This study demonstrates one way to account for the linguistic implications of individuals’ shifting allegiances to places they live(d).     

The Aggregation of Political Rhetoric in Zeitoun

While the initial literary and cultural response to 9/11 consisted mostly of domestic narratives of trauma and mourning that avoided explicit political discourse, narrative representations of Hurricane Katrina, from the beginning, have been highly political. This is a profound, if simplistic, inversion: an act of political violence is de-politicized by its cultural response, while a natural disaster is overtly politicized. While the politicization of Hurricane Katrina is clearly, in part, down to the many accusations of negligence and racism that were immediately leveled at the American government after the post-Katrina flooding of New Orleans, this article argues that a major politicizing factor is and was the de-politicization of 9/11. Many narratives of Hurricane Katrina, therefore, are loaded with an aggregation of dissent and political discourse that relates not just to Katrina but also to 9/11 and the War on Terror. This article focuses specifically on Dave Eggers’s narrative non-fiction account of Katrina, Zeitoun (2009) and the way it responds to the domestication of 9/11 in these early instances of 9/11 fiction, and, in particular Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (2006). It argues that Zeitoun responds to The Road’s conservative, messianic allegory, its retrograde formulation of frontier masculinity and unlikely recourse to the domestic. Eggers’s narrative non-fiction account of Katrina is also a migrant story and it is able to both dramatize the social realities of the War on Terror and build a surprising and affecting narrative of community and pluralism in the wake of disaster. Ultimately, this comparative analysis illuminates a wider and revealing departure from the cultural representation of 9/11 in the cultural response to Hurricane Katrina where texts like Zeitoun, are overtly political and loaded with the weight of two catastrophes.     

Social Policy, “Deservingness,” and Sociotemporal Marginalization: Katrina Survivors and FEMA

Limiting assistance in the context of the neoliberal U.S. welfare state relies on a distinction between the deserving and undeserving poor. Hurricane Katrina survivors were caught between two opposing cultural characterizations—”deserving” disaster victims and “undeserving” welfare cheats. In this article, I examine Hurricane Katrina survivors' experiences with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)'s rental assistance policies and practices, as their experiences reveal important aspects of how aid is allocated in the context of the contemporary U.S. welfare state, and what consequences this has for marginalized populations. I analyze in‐depth interviews and field observations with displaced Katrina survivors and find that FEMA policies and practices assumed a “middle class” model of family structure and economic standing. Those who did not fit into this model were made to wait while their cases were investigated, which had negative psychological and material consequences. I argue that being made to wait, or temporal domination, is a central component of the larger sociotemporal marginalization of the poor, or the way in which time structures social stratification. Temporal domination is a feature of neoliberal social policy, neither maliciously intended nor entirely unintended, that has the consequence of punishing the “undeserving.”     

When the levee breaks: treating adolescents and families in the aftermath of hurricane katrina

Hurricane Katrina brought to the surface serious questions about the capacity of the public health system to respond to community-wide disaster. The storm and its aftermath severed developmentally protective family and community ties; thus its consequences are expected to be particularly acute for vulnerable adolescents. Research confirms that teens are at risk for a range of negative outcomes under conditions of life stress and family disorganization. Specifically, the multiple interacting risk factors for substance abuse in adolescence may be compounded when families and communities have experienced a major trauma. Further, existing service structures and treatments for working with young disaster victims may not address their risk for co-occurring substance abuse and traumatic stress reactions because they tend to be individually or peer group focused, and fail to consider the multi-systemic aspects of disaster recovery. This article proposes an innovative family-based intervention for young disaster victims, based on an empirically supported model for adolescent substance abuse, Multidimensional Family Therapy (MDFT; Liddle, 2002). Outcomes and mechanisms of the model's effects are being investigated in a randomized clinical trial with clinically referred substance-abusing teens in a New Orleans area community impacted by Hurricane Katrina.     

Help or hype: Symbolic or behavioral communication during Hurricane Katrina

Public relations professionals increasingly rely on the World Wide Web to communicate with their publics on a variety of issues, including the corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts the organization has undertaken. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, there is an opportunity to discover how the Best 100 Global Brands used their corporate websites and the power of their brand equity to help the victims of the disaster, as well as to communicate their own CSR efforts. Results show that 51% of these Top 100 firms had messages on their homepages about Hurricane Katrina, and 86% of those firms made donations totaling $105,000,000. The remaining 14% of firms exhibited symbolic communication only, with links to philanthropic organizations aiding rescue efforts.     

How to evacuate a psychiatric hospital: a Hurricane Katrina success story

This article describes the successful evacuation of an entire psychiatric hospital from New Orleans, Louisiana, to Memphis, Tennessee, on a weekend night. The destination site was 400 miles away and buses were used for transport. The evacuation occurred shortly before Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and included 73 adult, adolescent, and child acute psychiatric patients. Thirty-five staff members also participated in the evacuation with their families and pets. This report is significant because little is known about how to implement a disaster plan that involves the transport of an entire psychiatric hospital-patients, nurses, physicians, staff, and family members--to another city. The knowledge gained can also benefit psychiatric nurses and their organizations when establishing or modifying their disaster plans.     

Hope Floats: African American Women's Survival Experiences after Katrina

This article describes how 15 African American women 18 to 55 years of age coped with traumatic life events during and in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The study's main question is how did African American women cope with traumatic events during and following Hurricane Katrina? Second, we explore how the intersection of race, gender, and social class influenced their experiences. An exploratory design of primary and secondary data using grounded theory methods generates a mid-level theory about resilience, spirituality and coping among Black women in the aftermath of the storm.     

Break-up of New Orleans Households after Hurricane Katrina

Theory and evidence on disaster-induced population displacement have focused on individual and population-subgroup characteristics. Less is known about impacts on households. I estimate excess incidence of household break-up due to Hurricane Katrina by comparing a probability sample of pre-Katrina New Orleans resident adult household heads and non-household heads (N = 242), traced just over a year later, with a matched sample from a nationally representative survey over an equivalent period. One in three among all adult non-household heads, and one in two among adult children of household heads, had separated from the household head 1 year post-Katrina. These rates were, respectively, 2.2 and 2.7 times higher than national rates. A 50% higher prevalence of adult children living with parents in pre-Katrina New Orleans than nationally increased the hurricane's impact on household break-up. Attention to living arrangements as a dimension of social vulnerability in disaster recovery is suggested.     

Waiting in the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans: A Case Study of the Tempography of Hyper‐Marginalization

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina residents were forced to wait. Here the state played a familiar role where waiting is used to dominate or subordinate or further marginalize the poor. Residents of the Lower Ninth Ward, however, used waiting as a basis for interacting with other community members and as a way to structure social life. In doing so, they created a timescape of hyper‐marginalization where waiting became normative. In examining this timescape, I conduct a tempography of the neighborhood and distinguish between three forms of waiting as interaction.     

ADJUSTING TO UNCERTAINTY: COPING STRATEGIES AMONG THE DISPLACED AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA

This study examined the coping strategies of individuals displaced after Hurricane Katrina. Following the evacuation of New Orleans, surveys were administered to those individuals displaced by Katrina and relocated to shelters or in Disaster Centers in Cape Cod, Massachusetts; Lansing, Michigan; different parts of Indiana and Kentucky; and federal aid distribution centers throughout Texas. Results indicated that talking, staying informed, and praying emerged as predictors of changes in psychological stress during relocation. Differences emerged in coping strategies based on gender, race, and income; however, age did not emerge as a factor. Recommendations are made to use these results for postcrisis response and coordination.     

A Quiet Suffering: Some Notes on the Sociology of Suffering1

Despite a recent increase in attention within the social sciences, suffering remains for the most part outside of the purview of sociologists. In this essay, I explore the possibilities for a sociology of suffering by briefly interrogating suffering in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in the Lower Ninth Ward, the epicenter of the hurricane and the federal levee failures.     

LIES,DAMN LIES,AND RUMORS: AN ANALYSIS OF COLLECTIVE EFFICACY,RUMORS, AND FEAR IN THE WAKE OF KATRINA

In the days following Hurricane Katrina, many displaced residents from New Orleans evacuated to the Baton Rouge area. As a result, many Baton Rougians became increasingly concerned about crime in their community. This concern, coupled with a lack of official information, led to the widespread dissemination of rumors of criminal victimization. The purpose of this study is to examine the relations between collective efficacy, rumors, and fear during this trying time for Baton Rouge. The results are based on telephone interviews with Baton Rouge residents conducted two months after Katrina. As predicted, collective efficacy fosters the transmission of rumors. These rumors then lead to increased personal and altruistic fear of victimization; therefore, collective efficacy indirectly increases fear through its effect on rumors. The implications of these findings for public and emergency management policy are discussed as are concrete suggestions for future research.     

From Iraq to Katrina and Back: Bureaucratic Planning as Strategic Failure,Fiction, and Fantasy

Bureaucratic planning is a complex sociocultural process rife with vested interests, contradictory aims, and internal conflicts. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the US occupation of Iraq, contemporary media discourses on planning have downplayed this complexity and diverted attention away from a more nuanced understanding of planning as a sociological process. In this article, I show how policy and press debates regarding bureaucratic planning in Iraq and New Orleans are rooted in technocratic and rationalist perspectives, constituting a kind of modernist faith. These contemporary discourses are often one‐dimensional, failing to consider the conflicts, contradictions, and counter‐intuitive outcomes that are inherent in planning in complex situations, including urban reconstruction, military occupation, and disaster response. I show how flawed approaches in the present are deeply linked to the past, connecting Iraq and Katrina to a detailed ethnographic case study on failed urban planning in colonial Zanzibar. Even though the three cases of Iraq, Katrina, and Zanzibar differ across time, context, and conditions, they reveal that bureaucratic planning is best understood as a multidimensional strategic practice that is intrinsically shaped by sociocultural forms. Plans may ostensibly fail in one sense and yet still produce quite enduring effects. They may remain ‘fictions’ at one level but still wield real impact. And even if they are informed by fantasy, bearing little utility from a functional perspective, plans still serve as performative and persuasive acts, informed by political ends.     

“Katrina Bloggers Activate!”: The Long‐Term Effects of Digital Media on Civic Participation

There is a lively debate on the relationship between digital media and civic participation. Some scholars argue that digital media adversely affect civic participation, others that the effect of digital media on civic participation is negligible, and still others claim that digital media strengthens civic participation. Yet, most of this research is based on cross‐sectional methodologies, treats digital media as a uniform entity, and overlooks new civic formations that better resonate with current social and technological environments. We address these criticisms with a retrospective case study of blogging in the wake of hurricane Katrina. Through in‐depth interviews, supplemental survey data, analysis of blog posts, and field notes, we show how a number of New Orleans’ residents used blogs to organize and take part in a variety of civic actions in the months and years after hurricane Katrina. We discuss the implications of these findings for current debates on the relationship between digital media and civic participation.     

Sociology and the Art of Risk

In contemporary society, risk has become an ever-present issue that appears across a range of social domains, such as health, welfare, crime, national security and the environment. High-profile risk incidents such as 9/11, the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans have served to underscore the global significance of risk. Although risk has conventionally been approached in the natural sciences as an object to be technically mastered by mathematical probability, since the early 1980s social scientists have focussed on the subjective and social dimensions of risk. This article traces the contours of the 'turn to risk' within sociology, outlining the central tenets of the risk society, governmentality and sociocultural theories. Both the utility of and the limits to these theories are demonstrated through practical application. The article concludes by considering some of the problems and contradictions that arise out of the sociological turn to risk.     

President Bush's major post-Katrina speeches: Enhancing image repair discourse theory applied to the public sector

When Hurricane Katrina swept the Gulf Coast, President Bush's newly formed Department of Homeland Security received its first test and failed. In Katrina's aftermath, Bush not only had to manage one of the nation's worst natural disasters, but also had to quell political backlash about the federal government's response to Katrina. This study examines: (a) how Bush presented the federal response to Katrina in his speeches; (b) how Bush responded to the public's criticism in his speeches; and (c) how effective Bush's speeches were in repairing his tarnished image.     

THE IMPACT OF INFORMATION AND RISK PERCEPTION ON THE HURRICANE EVACUATION DECISION-MAKING OF GREATER NEW ORLEANS RESIDENTS

This article contributes to the current discussion on how residents living in vulnerable areas make the decision to evacuate when they are in harms way. Key in this discussion is the question, what role does information and risk play in shaping evacuation behavior? This study used a sample of respondents from the greater New Orleans region (Orleans, Jefferson, and St. Bernard Parishes) of the Twelve Parish Survey (N = 1,207) conducted prior to Hurricane Katrina. The findings indicate that information sources are vitally important in the evacuation process. By examining the role of information from authorities, family, and friends; visual imagery; and the media we found that individuals use a variety of sources when they decide to evacuate. Further, the importance of visual imagery in the evacuation process is discussed. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of information dissemination and its importance to members of the media and public policy makers.     

President Bush's image repair discourse on Hurricane Katrina

Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and the surrounding area on August 29, 2005. This storm was devastating, causing death, injury, dislocation, and massive property damage. President Bush came under fire for the apparently slow and inept federal response. On September 15 President Bush gave a speech to repair his image. He employed three principal strategies: bolstering, defeasibility, and corrective action. An evaluation of how these strategies were used in his persuasive message judged his image repair effort to be largely ineffective. Bolstering did not counteract the slow response (e.g., Bush waited days to visit the area). Defeasibility is risky for a president to use because it explicitly portrays him as unable to solve the problem. Corrective action was too little (often proposals rather than direct action—and proposals with important unanswered questions) too late. Evidence of the public reaction is consistent with this unfavorable evaluation.