This ethnographic research project contrasts two sites of extreme heat: Imperial Valley, California, a dry, desert region on the US-Mexico border and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which boasts miles of coastline but also landlocked neighborhoods that are home to millions of residents who live and work in this hot and humid climate. In the interests of climate and environmental justice, this research seeks to understand residents’ daily experiences of extreme heat and the factors that impact their ability to cool down. Both locations are sites of stark social and racial inequality: While the median household income is San Diego County is $102,000 (over 40% of residents are white), the median household income in Imperial Valley County is around $56,000 (less than 10% of residents are white). In Rio de Janeiro, though the population of the city is roughly 42% white, the wealthier Zona Sul neighborhoods – with easy access to the beach – are over 80% white. In Brazil, racial disparities in income are severe, with white workers earning up to 40% more on average than Black and brown (pardo) workers. Structural racism goes beyond the formal labor market, and it is estimated that 3.5 million workers in Rio work in the informal economy without any labor protections.

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Understanding the impact of extreme heat involves asking deeper questions about how environmental racism and climate injustice put certain bodies at risk due to where people live, where they work, and how they move around. Racial beliefs that nonwhite bodies can better handle the heat explain (in part) why higher percentages of brown and Black people live without access to air conditioning, why nonwhite people are more vulnerable to sun exposure due to their overrepresentation in manual labor, and why brown and Black neighborhoods are less likely to benefit from the cooling effects of trees. Changes in laws, public policies, and cooling technologies will depend on a more in-depth understanding of the impacts of extreme heat on marginalized communities.

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Access our latest findings on extreme heat across the Imperial Valley and Rio de Janeiro via the buttons below.

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