Hanna Garth

For many decades residents of South Los Angeles have faced ongoing economic difficulties and political struggles. The disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the health and economic wellbeing of the South LA community has shifted the kinds of struggles that area households face. Community organizations developed rapid emergency interventions to address immediate needs for secure housing and sufficient food and water supplies. As the community recovers from the pandemic and their household needs shift, they will draw on community resources, kinship networks, and friends in new and diverse ways. This research seeks to understand how South LA residents navigate area infrastructures and community organizations in order to facilitate access to basic needs and enable survival. This is a collaboration with Community Services Unlimited, Inc. (CSU), originally the non-profit arm of the Southern California Chapter of the Black Panther Party (BPP). While providing CSU with the data necessary to adapt their programming to emergent needs in post-pandemic Los Angeles, this research also builds on anthropological scholarship around infrastructure and resource distribution to analyze how households maintain and create new forms of intimacy and kinship as they envision a future in which they may live and thrive.