Necropolis

Winner of the Frederick Jackson Turner Award Winner of James H. Broussard Best First Book Prize, SHEAR Winner of the Kemper and Leila Williams Prize in Louisiana History Winner of the Humanities Book of the Year Award, Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities A brilliant bookThis transformative work is a pivotal addition to the scholarship on American slavery. Annette Gordon-Reed A stunning account of high-risk, high-reward profiteering in the yellow feverridden Crescent Citya world in which a deadly virus altered every aspect of a brutal social system, exacerbating savage inequalities of enslavement, race, and class. John Fabian Witt, author of American Contagions Olivariuss new perspectives on yellow fever, immunocapitalism, and the politics of acclimationwill influence a generation of scholars to come on the intersections of racism, slavery, and public health. The Lancet In antebellum New Orleans, at the heart of Americas slave and cotton kingdoms, epidemics of yellow fever killed as many as 150,000 people. With little understanding of the origins of the illnessand meager public health infrastructureones only hope if infected was to survive, providing the lucky few with a mysterious form of immunity. Repeated epidemics bolstered New Orleanss strict racial hierarchy by introducing another hierarchy, a form of immunocapital, as white survivors leveraged their immunity to pursue economic and political advancement while enslaved Blacks were relegated to the most grueling labor. The question of healthwho has it, who doesnt, and whyis always in part political. Necropolis shows how powerful nineteenth-century Orleanians constructed a society that capitalized on mortal risk and benefited from the chaos that ensued.