This summer, adjunct professor Barry Yeoman traveled to Louisiana’s fragile coastline to interview the people who are holding the region together, both environmentally and culturally. The result is a multimedia collaboration with photographer John Noltner called “Still Here.” It’s being published in weekly installments by Noltner’s non-profit storytelling project, A Peace of My Mind. You can find it here.

“During our nine days in South Louisiana, John and I heard a lot about disappearance,” Yeoman wrote. “Not only are wetlands vanishing, but so is Black-owned farmland. So are the livelihoods of shrimpers and the tradition of eating Gulf of Mexico seafood. So are local grocery stores, neighborhood music clubs, affordable houses.” And yet, he continued, “we met people who have planted their stakes in that marshy ground, saying, We’re still here. We’re not going away. This place is too precious to abandon.”

Each of the 10 interviews features a Q&A podcast, along with text, photography, and sometimes video. The interviewees are diverse. They include Chief Devon Parfait,  a climate refugee who is using his science background to lead the Grand Caillou/Dulac Band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw; Kristian Bailey, an indigo farmer who works with nature instead of trying to conquer it; Ebony Woodruff, an attorney working to stem the loss of Black farmland; Alex Kolker, an oceanographer and geologist whose recent discovery offers hope for rebuilding wetlands; Prasanta Subudhi, a scientist developing rice that will endure climate change; and Rosina Philippe, whose tribe is developing new ways to flourish even as its land crumbles.

Learn more about Yeoman from a recent profile in The Old Gold & Black by Henry Holt ’29.