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KATRINA, BLACK WOMEN, AND THE DEADLY DISCOURSE ON BLACK POVERTY IN AMERICA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2006

Barbara Ransby
Barbara Ransby
Affiliation:
Department of African American Studies and Department of History, University of Illinois at Chicago
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Abstract

This article explores the suffering and resilience of Black women who were impacted by Hurricane Katrina in August of 2005. It also explores the ways in which the pre-existing national discourse on poverty, race, and gender set the stage for victim blaming and the neglect of poor Black women and children after the storm. African American women in the Gulf Coast region are some of the poorest in the nation. Women in general are more vulnerable in times of natural disaster because they are the primary caretakers of the young and the old. These factors and others meant that poor Black women were among those most severely impacted by Hurricane Katrina. They also had minimal resources to cope with the disaster and its aftermath. However, instead of sympathy and support, some conservative pundits have sought to link the suffering caused by Katrina to the lack of patriarchal Black family structures, which they argue could have helped individuals survive in the crisis. Contrary to these stereotypes, many Black women have not only been resilient and self-reliant, but creative and heroic in the face of crisis. It is their stories that offer hope for the future of New Orleans and our nation.

Keywords

Hurricane KatrinaAfrican American WomenPovertyStereotypesResilienceSelf-help
Type
STATE OF THE DISCOURSE
Information
Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race , Volume 3 , Issue 1 , March 2006 , pp. 215 - 222
Copyright
© 2006 W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research

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References

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