'Roots Run Deep Here': The Construction of Black New Orleans in Post-Katrina Tourism Narratives

Authors

Lynnell L. Thomas, University of Massachusetts BostonFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-1-2009

Abstract

This article explores the emergent post-Katrina tourism narrative and its ambivalent racialization of the city. Tourism officials are compelled to acknowledge a New Orleans outside the traditional tourist boundaries – primarily black, often poor, and still largely neglected by the city and national governments. On the other hand, tourism promoters do not relinquish (and do not allow tourists to relinquish) the myths of racial exoticism and white supremacist desire for a construction of blacks as artistically talented but socially inferior.

Comments

Copyright ©2009 The Johns Hopkins University Press. This article was first published in American Quarterly 61.3 (2009), 749-768. Reprinted with permission by The Johns Hopkins University Press.

Recommended Citation

Lynnell L. Thomas. "'Roots Run Deep Here': The Construction of Black New Orleans in Post-Katrina Tourism Narratives" American Quarterly 61.3 (2009): 749-768.