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- Title
RACE, GENDER AND CLASS LESSONS FROM HURRICANE KATRINA.
- Authors
Belkhir, Jean Ait; Charlemaine, Christiane
- Abstract
In the public imagination, natural disasters do not discriminate, but are instead "equal opportunity" calamities. Hurricanes may not single out victims by their race, or gender or class but neither do such disasters occur in historical, political, social, or economic vacuums. Instead, the consequences of such catastrophes replicate and exacerbate the effects of extant inequalities, and often bring into stark relief the importance of political institutions, processes, ideologies, and norms. In the words of New York Times' columnist David Brooks, storms like Hurricane Katrina "wash away the surface of society, the settled way things have been done. They expose the underlying power structures, the injustices, the patterns of corruption and the unacknowledged inequalities. The last two decades alone have provided a series of examples that demonstrate the vast inequalities of U.S. democratic system, particularly as they are manifested along racial, gender and class lines. A truly race, gender and class left would want to eliminate class inequality. But, in the race, gender and class trinity class is the odd factor. Mainstream race, gender and class social and academic activists want to get rid of race and gender inequality but "forget" class inequality.
- Subjects
UNITED States; HURRICANE Katrina, 2005; GENDER; RACE; SOCIAL classes; BROOKS, David; HURRICANES; NATURAL disasters; POLITICAL doctrines
- Publication
Race, Gender & Class, 2007, Vol 14, Issue 1/2, p120
- ISSN
1082-8354
- Publication type
Article