Listening to Puerto Rico

On September 20, 2017, Hurricane María struck the island of Puerto Rico with catastrophic force, shattering lives, communities, infrastructure and the physical environment. Puerto Rico remains in the grips of an ongoing and systematic crisis.

In June 2018, teams from the University of Michigan and the University of Notre Dame traveled to Puerto Rico to film testimonies from Puerto Ricans from all walks of life. As you explore the content on this site, you will hear powerful narratives of loss and recovery, abandonment and resilience, failure and hope as you come to better understand Puerto Rico’s past, present, and future. These individual testimonials are complemented by resources that are meant to deepen your understanding of an urgent multidimensional crisis that involves policy, culture and history, political economy, environmental loss, civil infrastructure, public health, and human dignity.

On the Listening to Puerto Rico site, you will hear from a number of successful organizations, strategies and solutions that are contributing to Puerto Rico’s recovery. Understanding begins with listening. But “listening” is not just about hearing people’s words: it also implies taking notice of, and acting on, what people say. Shaped by the individual experience of everyday life, the Listening to Puerto Rico initiative invites you to hear many voices from a distressed but resilient island and discover how you can contribute to the island’s recovery.

The Listening to Puerto Rico initiative began with the collaboration between the University of Michigan and the University of Notre Dame on the Listening to Puerto Rico Teach-Out that ran on Coursera between Aug 24, 2018, and Sept 24, 2018. See our Project Team page for details on all those involved in creating this project.