Robin Bo Eun McDowell

“Black Bayou” traces five centuries of encounters between African-descended peoples, petroleum, sugar, and salt in Louisiana swamps. These hybrid landscapes of water and land—the Black Bayou—became active participants in systems that define the present: racial formations entangled in uneven production of space; the subjugation of labor; global extraction of resources; and human-driven environmental destruction on an unprecedented scale. Drawing on case studies in south Louisiana, “Black Bayou” shines light on a central paradox: Louisiana bayous cultivated and protected Black and Indigenous life for centuries—creating spaces for escape, pleasure, and revolt—while steeping the primordial compounds with which Louisiana would build a modern economy that continues to prey on people of color.