Monique Verdin, UNITED HOUMA NATION, USA

I returned home to Louisiana in the late 1990s, which was when I started photography, mainly in Terrebonne and Lafrouche Parishes. During that time I learned about my camera, my family, our land, and our politics. I now think of myself as a reporter raising awareness about the socioeconomic and racial injustices we’ve tolerated for decades. For more than 10 years, I’ve been intimately documenting the day-to-to-day lives of communities along the southern coastal parishes, including my indigenous Houma family’s complex interconnected relationship to the environment, economics, culture, climate, and change. I want to capture what it means to live permanently on the edge, both figuratively and literally, and to foster change. To that end, I have also been a proud member of the Tribal Council since June, 2016.