Remaking New Orleans: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity

Published by Duke University Press 2019

Remaking New Orleans

Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity

Edited by: Thomas Jessen Adams and Matt Sakakeeny

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781478003328

Overview
Contents

About this book

The contributors to Remaking New Orleans challenge the uncritical acceptance of New Orleans-as-exceptional narratives, showing how they flatten the diversity, experience, and culture of the city's residents and obscure other possible understandings.

Author / Editor information

Thomas Jessen Adams is Lecturer in History and American Studies, Academic Director of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, and coeditor of Working in the Big Easy: The History and Politics of Labor in New Orleans.

Matt Sakakeeny is Associate Professor of Music at Tulane University and author of Roll With It: Brass Bands in the Streets of New Orleans, also published by Duke University Press.

Reviews

"Offering valuable insights into the history of the city and the oft-repeated musings of what makes New Orleans special or unique, Remaking New Orleans parses tourism, urban redevelopment, and the attendant myths, misconceptions, and impacts."

-- Andru Okun Antigravity

"In a crowded field of New Orleans–centered, post-Katrina scholarship, Remaking New Orleans—albeit ironically—is a true standout. ... It would make a fitting text for an upper-year undergraduate seminar or graduate-level course on, for example, cities and neoliberalism."

-- Gregg Lightfoot Journal of Southern History

“Adams and Sakakeeny’s Remaking New Orleans represents a remarkable collection of stories…. Topically, the volume enriches our historical geography of the city.”

-- Eric Nost Southeastern Geographer

“The editors Thomas Jessen Adams an Matt Sakakeeny and their contributors offer a welcome, convincing, and overdue rebuke of representations of New Orleans as a city lying outside broader contexts.... Remaking New Orleans succeeds in rendering an indictment against seeing this city as exceptional rather than exemplary.”

-- J. Mark Souther Journal of American History

“The authors present provocative questions.... This collection will be useful to scholars of urban history, cultural studies, and all those who are fascinated by New Orleans.”

-- Ella Howard Journal of American Culture

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction: What Lies beyond Histories of Exceptionalism and Cultures of Authenticity Thomas Jessen Adams, Sue Mobley and Matt Sakakeeny Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part one. Constructing Exceptional New Orleans
1 La Catrina The Mexican Specter of New Orleans Shannon Lee Dawdy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
2 Charles Gayarré and the Imagining of an Exceptional City The Literary Roots of the Creole City Rien Fertel Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	55
3 Phony City Under the Skin of Authenticity Aaron Nyerges Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	72
Part two. Producing Authentic New Orleans
4 “Things You’d Imagine Zulu Tribes to Do” The Zulu Parade in New Orleans Carnival Felipe Smith Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	93
5 The Saga of the Junkyard Dog Bryan Wagner Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	117
6 Local, Native, Creole, Black Claiming Belonging, Producing Autochthony Helen A. Regis Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	138
7 The Contradictions of the Film Welfare Economy, or, For the Love of Treme Vicki Mayer, Heidi Schmalbach and Toby Miller Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	162
Part three. What Is New Orleans Identity?
8 “Queers, Fairies, and Ne’er-Do- Wells” Rethinking the Notion of a Sexually Liberal New Orleans Alecia P. Long Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	179
9 Building Black Suburbs in New Orleans Vern Baxter and Maria Casati Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	199
10 Refugee Pastoralism Vietnamese American Self-Representation in New Orleans Marguerite Nguyen Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	219
Part four. Predictive City?
11 Boosting the Private Sector Federal Aid and Downtown Development in the 1970s Megan French-Marcelin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	241
12 What’s Left for New Orleans? The People’s Reconstruction and the Limits of Anarcho-Liberalism Cedric G. Johnson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	261
13 Neoliberal Futures Post-Katrina New Orleans, Volunteers, and the Ongoing Allure of Exceptionalism Vincanne Adams Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	288
14 The Myth of Authenticity and Its Impact on Politics—in New Orleans and Beyond Adolph Reed Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	307
References Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	327
Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	351
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	355

Language: English
Publisher: Duke University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 368
Illustrations
- Other: 8 illustrations

eBook

Published: April 4, 2019
ISBN: 9781478003328