 | Governing Affect: Neoliberalism and Disaster Reconstruction Subjects: Disaster relief -- Social aspects -- Case studies; Natural disasters -- Social aspects -- Case studies; Hurricane Mitch 1998 -- Social aspects -- Honduras; Disaster relief -- Social aspects -- Honduras; Hurricane Katrina 2005 -- Social aspects -- Louisi; Roberto E. Barrios presents an ethnographic study of the aftermaths of four natural disasters: southern Honduras after Hurricane Mitch; New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina; Chiapas, Mexico, after the Grijalva River landslide; and southern Illinois following the Mississippi River flood. Focusing on the role of affect, Barrios examines the ways in which people who live through disasters use emotions as a means of assessing the relevance of governmentally sanctioned recovery plans, judging the effectiveness of such programs, and reflecting on the risk of living in areas that have been deemed prone to disaster. Emotions such as terror, disgust, or sentimental attachment to place all shape the meanings we assign to disasters as well as our political responses to them. Roberto E. Barrios is an associate professor of anthropology at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale. |
