Rethinking American Disasters is a pathbreaking collection of essays on hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, and other calamities in the United States and British colonial America over four centuries. Proceeding from the premise that there is no such thing as a "natural" disaster, the collection invites readers to consider disasters and their aftermaths as artifacts of and vantage points onto their historical contexts.

Cynthia A. Kierner is the author of many books, including Inventing Disaster: The Culture of Calamity from the Jamestown Colony to the Johnstown Flood.

Matthew Mulcahy has written or cowritten several books and articles about natural disasters in colonial British America, including Hurricanes and Society in the British Greater Caribbean, 1624-1783.

Liz Skilton is the author of Tempest: Hurricane Naming and American Culture and head of the Recent Louisiana Disasters Oral History Project.