The battle over meaning: Digitally mediated processes of cultural trauma and repair in the wake of hurricane Katrina

Abstract

In this article, we highlight the social processes involved in the construction of cultural trauma and repair, and how these processes are digitally mediated. In national news coverage following hurricane Katrina, a number of displaced residents saw threats to a particular cultural identity they shared with the city. This motivated them to blog. Through their blogging, they took part in constructing cultural trauma and repair. Drawing largely on interview data and qualitative content analyses of blog posts of New Orleans resident bloggers, we show how geographically scattered individuals used blogs to foment cultural trauma by directing each other’s attention to these threats. We then demonstrate how they engaged in cultural repair by producing culturally affirming counter-narratives and physical collective actions. With this research, we build on existing literature in cultural trauma theory in three ways. We identify the nuanced and long-term processes that underlie the construction of both cultural trauma and repair. We highlight how digital media allow users to transcend the boundaries between carrier agents and audiences. We illustrate the duality of digital media in the creation of cultural trauma and repair, where the media serves as both the field upon which collective identity is contested, and a tool wielded in these battles.