Louisiana Doesn't Look Like What You Think It Looks Like
On the Media | Aug 26, 2016
According to a famous statistic, Louisiana is losing about a football field of land every hour due to coastal erosion. That's 16 square miles lost every year; between the 1930s and 2000, land mass equaling the size of Delaware disappeared.
So why hasn't the shape of the state changed? Why do we still see the iconic boot as the symbol of Louisiana?
In 2014, Brett Anderson of the Times-Picayune wrote "Louisiana Loses Its Boot" for the website Matter. The piece proposes a radical reassessment of what we think of as "Louisiana," a new symbol that doesn't include marshland as solid land. Anderson talks to Brooke about why his map still isn't accurate, but why he hopes it'll start a conversation.
Song:
"It's Raining" by Irma Thomas
