"The change is not in itself, but in them"

BY MICHAEL PASQUIER

“Look out at that ocean, that sky, the fish, the birds, wild and wicked out in the chaos. Is there a god that can deliver us from the chaos of nature?”

--Reverend Carlton in the film Glory at Sea

This is an appropriate question to ask on a day when the Army Corps of Engineers opens a floodway that will displace at least 2,500 people, devastate thousands of acres of farmland, and destroy hundreds of homes and businesses in order to avoid the same tragedy in more populated areas like Baton Rouge (my home) and New Orleans.

Morganza Floodway (under normal conditions)

Morganza Floodway (1973)

Glory at Sea, according to its creators, is a 30-minute film about "a group of mourners and a man spat from the depths of Hades [who] build a boat from the debris of New Orleans to rescue their lost loved ones trapped beneath the sea."

Glory At Sea! from Court 13 on Vimeo.

From my perspective, Glory at Sea is a film about religion. It is about living in a broken world, seeking order in chaos, and finding meaning in suffering. It is about a people in exile, a people lost at sea, a people without a home. Recently, students in my “Religion in Louisiana” course watched the film and wrote an essay relating its themes to several other books about life in Louisiana and the Mississippi River Delta, including Brenda Marie Osbey's collection of poems All Saints, Tennessee Williams’ play Vieux Carré, and William Alexander Percy’s autobiography Lanterns on the Levee. They hated me for it. But they also got it.

What we’re watching along the Mississippi River is indeed about the chaos of nature, but it’s the kind that comes when we engineer nature in order to delivery us from chaos. William Alexander Percy knew a little something about the Mississippi River when he wrote, “The gods on their thrones are shaken and changed, but it abides, aloof and unappeasable, with no heart except for its own task, under the unbroken and immense arch of the lighted sky where the sun, too, goes a lonely journey. As a thing used by men it has changed: the change is not in itself, but in them.”

Pasquier on the Impact of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

Randall Stephens

Mike Pasquier has been a busy guy. In addition to writing his rich study of Jesuits in late 18th and 19th century America, our fellow RiAH blogger has been collaborating with other LSU researchers who are studying the impact of the Deepwater Hoirzon oil spill. Ashley Berthelot at LSU Gold reports:

Michael Pasquier, assistant professor of religious studies and historian at LSU, has developed "Standard Lives: Visualizing the Culture of Oil in Louisiana." The goal of this project is to complement scientific investigations of the Deepwater Horizon disaster by documenting the cultural impact of environmental stressors on Louisiana's coastal communities.

"To do this, it's necessary to look at oil from 'the ground up,' so to speak," said Pasquier. "I knew we needed to take a long and unbiased look at Louisiana's relationship with the oil industry, and by extension, its effects on the everyday lives of refinery and offshore workers, as well as the businessmen, teachers, farmers, fishermen, mariners, homemakers and others with direct and indirect ties to petroleum-based services."

Pasquier started his project by delving into a photo collection at the University of Louisville that showcased in detail how the industry fundamentally transformed the social and environmental landscape of Louisiana at mid-century. . . .

"As a native of Louisiana, I grew up in a family and in communities with deep stakes in the oil industry, so I already had my finger on the pulse of a people economically and culturally invested in oil. Now, what I wanted to do was to find a way to look behind the typical photos of a literally oiled landscape to see the faces of people who are directly impacted by even the most subtle of economic and environmental changes," said Pasquier. "When we look at the photos of oily pelicans or an oiled coastline, we should also be trying to understand the backstory that was there long before the oil spill. We should also be looking for the everyday human story that isn't drenched in oil." . . .

"This isn't about justifying our use of oil, or being pro-oil or pro-environment," Pasquier said. "It's about assessing the terrible consequences of the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster by taking the time to focus on and understand the big picture, the realities that exist in everyday life for many Louisianans. This is about our history and our culture – this is about us and our future." read on >>>

Many of us heard Mike's preview of this tremendous work at the 2010 AAR. Can't wait to see the eight short documentaries that will result!