New Orleans, Louisiana: America’s most culturally and culinarily unique city

Bayou city rebuilt after devastating hurricane to retain its status as a travel destination

Today's expression: Wind through
Explore more: Lesson #569
May 4, 2023:

New Orleans, Louisiana, is a mixture of unique cuisines and cultures. Located where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf of Mexico, the city suffered a devastating hurricane in 2005. But it recovered and the city's tourism industry, including its famed Bourbon Street, is as strong as ever. Plus, learn the English phrasal verb "wind through."

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Today you’ll learn about New Orleans, often called the most culturally unique city in the United States

Lesson summary

Hi there everyone, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, where we help you upgrade your English with current events and trending topics. The audio goes a little bit slower than native speed, so you can understand every word. And if you’d like to get even more learning resources for this lesson, you can visit PlainEnglish.com/569. JR, the producer, has uploaded our full set of learning resources for today, PlainEnglish.com/569

But right here in the audio lesson, you’ll learn all about New Orleans, Louisiana, the Big Easy as they call it, the birthplace of jazz music, the home of Bourbon Street, and the host of Mardi Gras. In the second half of the lesson, I’ll show you how to use the English phrasal verb “wind through.” And we have a song of the week from one of New Orleans’s most famous residents. Let’s get going.

New Orleans: culture, cuisine, music, and parties

The Mississippi River is the second-longest river in North America. It bisects the United States, running north to south. It played a pivotal role in the development of the interior of the country; today , it’s still a popular transportation route, moving grains, minerals, and other commodities.

In its southern section, it winds through hardwood forests, then marshland, then sandy lowlands, before finally spilling into the Gulf of Mexico, where the land is so low that it’s hard to tell the difference between the sandy islands and the sea.

It is here that the French settled a city in the year 1718; they named it New Orleans, after the Duke of Orleans. It was part of a territory called Louisiana. About half a century later, Louisiana became a Spanish colony. Another half century or so passed, and it became French again. But then in 1803, Napoleon sold all French territory in North America to the United States. Louisiana became an American state in 1812.

New Orleans today is a mixture of cultures, cuisines, traditions, and languages. It has its own dialect, called New Orleans English. Louisiana Creole cuisine blends African, French, Spanish, and Caribbean traditions. The city is considered the birthplace of jazz music and it’s a popular location to film Hollywood movies. The architecture, especially in the historic French Quarter, has an old-world charm.

But it’s a wonder the city even exists. In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina directly hit the low-lying city. The levees and flood walls that protected the city from the mighty Mississippi River failed, releasing a mass of river water into the city. Over eighty percent of the city’s area flooded. Although most people had evacuated, over 1,500 people still died in the floods. Thousands more took shelter in the football stadium or the convention center.

This was considered the worst engineering failure in American history at the time. Tens of thousands of people simply never returned to the city: the devastation was too much. The NBA basketball team left for Oklahoma City and stayed there. People wondered why anyone would want to live in New Orleans after such an ordeal. Before the hurricane, the city’s population was 454,000; in 2006, it was just 208,000. The population had fallen by more than half. The city had to justify its existence, or people would simply not come back.

Luckily, the French Quarter was spared the worst of the damage. The population eventually recovered; it’s smaller today than before the hurricane, but not by much. During the recovery, the city doubled down on its history, its culture, and tourism. The flood walls were rebuilt. And New Orleans today is considered the most culturally unique city in the United States.

Food is one reason. Gumbo is a thick stew, poured over rice. Common ingredients are chicken, sausage, celery, peppers, onions, and okra. Jambalaya is similar, combining rice, meat, and spices. A muffaletta is a sandwich with deli meat, cheese, and olive dressing. A po-boy is a sandwich on French bread; seafood like shrimp is the most popular ingredient. If you like seafood, try oysters and crawfish, too. Crawfish are a local specialty; they’re shellfish, a little like lobsters, but they live in shallow, fresh water. You can have them boiled, sauteed, baked, or fried.

At breakfast time, try shrimp and grits. Grits are like oatmeal, only made from ground corn and a lot of butter. If that’s not your thing, you can always get a shrimp omelet—it sounds weird putting seafood in eggs, but I’ll tell you, it’s delicious. Got a sweet tooth? Beignets are French donuts with powdered sugar on top. Pralines are a type of candy made with southern pecans.

You’ll need a full stomach to enjoy the city’s famed Bourbon Street. Bourbon Street is in the French Quarter, the architecturally distinctive neighborhood with buildings dating back to the colonial period. Though it’s named the French Quarter, most of the architecture dates to the city’s time as a Spanish, not a French, colony.

Bourbon Street is known for its music and its parties. It’s one of the few places in the U.S. where you can openly carry an alcoholic drink on the street. The weather is nice, so the doors and windows of the bars and restaurants are often open. Walk down the street until you hear a band you like. Enjoy the band for a while…and if you get bored, just take your drink with you and continue your walk.

I should warn you: New Orleans is considered a party destination. It’s a common destination for bachelor and bachelorette parties, graduation parties, spring break, and weekends away.

But if drinking isn’t your thing, you can avoid the crowds and visit the city’s art galleries, historic mansions, antique shops, boutique hotels, parks, gardens, and more. Not far from the city, you can explore nature preserves, swamps, and wetlands.

For museums, you can visit the Historic New Orleans Collection, a history museum in a two-century-old mansion. Or try the World War II museum. Why is there a World War II museum in New Orleans? The boats used by the Allies to land on the sandy beach in Normandy, France: they were invented in New Orleans.

Music fans always have something to do in New Orleans. In addition to the nightly music in the French Quarter, the city is home to music festivals of all kinds. A literary festival honors the playwright Tennessee Williams, who lived in the city when he wrote his famous play, “A Streetcar Named Desire.”

But the biggest cultural festival of all is Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday. It’s a two-week celebration that concludes the day before Ash Wednesday, usually late February and early March. There’s a parade every day of the festival, each one more elaborate than the last. A million people visit New Orleans each year to celebrate Mardi Gras.

Less clothing than considered decent

I remember Hurricane Katrina. The city was underwater. New Orleans was under the water. There is no other way to describe it. There was a real question about whether anyone would ever want to live there again. And a lot of people decided that they did not, or they could not. But the city built back smaller, and it’s a great place to visit if you want to see a totally unique place in the United States.

One more thing. Wikipedia is funny. It often talks about things in a plain, dry manner even if they’re kind of funny. So here’s a description of one Mardi Gras tradition; I’m reading it straight from Wikipedia: “Wearing less clothing than considered decent in other contexts during Mardi Gras has been documented since 1889.” So there you have it, another New Orleans tradition going back more than a century: wearing less clothing than considered decent in other contexts.

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Expression: Wind through