elbigeasyamigoblogger: LOS INVISIBLES: Latino Immigrants in the Post-Katrina Reconstruction of New Orleans

Year five of the post-Katrina reconstruction of New Orleans is upon us, and the dirtiest little secret of the recovery is that our rapid progress owes a tremendous debt to the Latino immigrants who have labored hard to rebuild the Big Easy. While the BP oil spill disaster is our latest reminder that we are a new millennium epicenter for man made and natural tragedies, the many setbacks that this recovering mini-metropolis has experienced include a nationally high murder rate and a corrupt police department under federal investigation.

Nonetheless, the city and its resilient people continue forward, and most people I speak to recognize that the Latino work force has been vital in transforming New Orleans into a livable city and a functioning tourist destination, still open for business even with the toxic oil that looms in our Mississippi waterways and the Gulf. However, the story of Latino immigrants and the reconstruction remains conspicuously absent when the post-storm narratives are accounted in the local and national press.

It’s as if the immigrants are living in a parallel universe as invisible inhabitants, laboring in the shadows of a science fiction reality. For years, los invisibles have been physically visible everywhere on rooftops and numerous construction sites, but they are ubiquitous and nowhere at the same time. The undocumented status of many has transformed them into a transparent people that are not recognized as fully human. This condition makes their suffering an obscure painful story that most prefer to ignore because foreigners are classified as aliens in this country, extraterrestrials from the Planet Other with a marginalized existence.

I recently interviewed three young day laborers, and each man shared stories of being cheated by ruthless contractors and local businesses. One worker with a wife and three children had put in two weeks at a major hotel in the French Quarter, but …

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