Full Description
Standing in the Need presents an intimate account of an African American family's ordeal after Hurricane Katrina. Before the storm struck, this family of one hundred fifty members lived in the bayou communities of St. Bernard Parish just outside New Orleans. Rooted there like the wild red iris of the coastal wetlands, the family had gathered for generations to cook and share homemade seafood meals, savor conversation, and refresh their interconnected lives.
In this lively narrative, Katherine Browne weaves together voices and experiences from eight years of post-Katrina research. Her story documents the heartbreaking struggles to remake life after everyone in the family faced ruin. Cast against a recovery landscape managed by outsiders, the efforts of family members to help themselves could get no traction; outsiders undermined any sense of their control over the process. In the end, the insights of the story offer hope. Written for a broad audience and supported by an array of photographs and graphics, Standing in the Need offers readers an inside view of life at its most vulnerable.
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Figures
Introduction
Part I. Shock Wave
1. When They Say Go
2. The Culture Broker
3. Not Just Any Red Beans
Part II. Wave of Trouble
4. Ruin and Relief
5. Trial by Trailer
6. Bayou Speech and Bayou Style
7. Whose Road Home?
8. Almost to the Ground
Part III. Wave of Reckoning
9. Settling
10. Call to Race
11. By and By
Coda
Appendix. Methodology
Notes
Bibliography
About the Author and Series Editor
Index
