Identity And Ideology In Haiti

Using a structurationist, phenomenological structuralism understanding of practical consciousness constitution as derived from what the author calls Haitian epistemology, Haitian/Vilokan Idealism, this book explores the nature and origins of the contemporary Haitian oppositional protest cry, "the children of Pétion v. the children of Dessalines." Although traditionally viewed within racial terms – the mulatto elites v. the African (black) poor majority – Mocombe suggests that the metaphor, contemporarily, as utilized by the educated black grandon class (middle-class bourgeois blacks) has come to represent Marxist categories for racial-class (nationalistic) struggles on the island of Haiti within the capitalist world-system under American hegemony. The ideological position of Pétion represents the neoliberal views of the mulatto/Arab elites and petit-bourgeois blacks; and nationalism, economic reform, and social justice represent the ideological and nationalistic positions of Dessalines as articulated by the grandon, actual children of Toussaint Louverture, seeking to speak for the African majority (the children of Sans Souci, the Congolese-born general of the Haitian Revolution) whose practical consciousness, the Vodou Ethic and the spirit of communism, differ from both the children of Dessalines and Pétion. In the final analysis, the moniker is a truncated understanding of Haitian identity constitution, ideologies, and their oppositions.

This work puts forth the argument that, in the Haitian diaspora in the USA, a new Haitian identity has emerged among the youth, which is tied to the practical consciousness of the black American underclass. Black Americans in the postindustrial capitalist world-system of America are no longer Africans. Instead, their practical consciousnesses are the product of two identities: the black bourgeoisie, or African Americans, on the one hand, under the leadership of educated professionals and preachers, and the black underclass, on the other hand, under the leadership of street and prison personalities, athletes, and entertainers vying for ideological and linguistic domination of black America. These two social class language games were, and still are, historically constituted by structural differentiation and different ideological apparatuses, the church and education on the one hand and the streets, prisons, and the athletic and entertainment industries on the other, of the global capitalist racial-class structure of inequality under American hegemony, which replaced the African ideological apparatuses of Vodou, peristyles, lakous, and agricultural production as found in Haiti, for example. Among Haitian youth in the US after 1986, following the topple of Jean-Claude “baby doc” Duvalier, the latter social class language game, the black American underclass, came to serve as the bearer of ideological and linguistic domination against Haitian bourgeois purposive-rationality, and agents of the Vodou Ethic and the spirit of communism.

Combining history, autobiography, and ethnography, Georges Woke Up Laughing provides a portrait of the Haitian experience of migration to the United States that illuminates the phenomenon of long-distance nationalism, the voicelessness of certain citizens, and the impotency of government in an increasingly globalized world. By presenting lively ruminations on his life as a Haitian immigrant, Georges Eugene Fouron—along with Nina Glick Schiller, whose own family history stems from Poland and Russia—captures the daily struggles for survival that bind together those who emigrate and those who stay behind. According to a long-standing myth, once emigrants leave their homelands—particularly if they emigrate to the United States—they sever old nationalistic ties, assimilate, and happily live the American dream. In fact, many migrants remain intimately and integrally tied to their ancestral homeland, sometimes even after they become legal citizens of another country. In Georges Woke Up Laughing the authors reveal the realities and dilemmas that underlie the efforts of long-distance nationalists to redefine citizenship, race, nationality, and political loyalty. Through discussions of the history and economics that link the United States with countries around the world, Glick Schiller and Fouron highlight the forces that shape emigrants’ experiences of government and citizenship and create a transborder citizenry. Arguing that governments of many countries today have almost no power to implement policies that will assist their citizens, the authors provide insights into the ongoing sociological, anthropological, and political effects of globalization. Georges Woke up Laughing will entertain and inform those who are concerned about the rights of people and the power of their governments within the globalizing economy. “In my dream I was young and in Haiti with my friends, laughing, joking, and having a wonderful time. I was walking down the main street of my hometown of Aux Cayes. The sun was shining, the streets were clean, and the port was bustling with ships. At first I was laughing because of the feeling of happiness that stayed with me, even after I woke up. I tried to explain my wonderful dream to my wife, Rolande. Then I laughed again but this time not from joy. I had been dreaming of a Haiti that never was.”—from Georges Woke Up Laughing

''Based on papers presented at a conference organized and held at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago, June 2004 - Introduction.''

Throughout Haitian history—from 17th century colonial Saint-Domingue to 21st century postcolonial Haiti—arguably, the Afro-Haitian religion of Vodou has been represented as an “unsettling faith” and a “cultural paradox,” as expressed in various forms and modes of Haitian thought and life including literature, history, law, politics, painting, music, and art. Competing voices and conflicting ideas of Vodou have emerged from each of these cultural symbols and intellectual expressions. The Vodouist discourse has not only pervaded every aspect of the Haitian life and experience, it has defined the Haitian cosmology and worldview. Further, the Vodou faith has had a momentous impact on the evolution of Haitian intellectual, aesthetic, and literary imagination; comparatively, Vodou has shaped Haitian social ethics, sexual and gender identity, and theological discourse such as in the intellectual works and poetic imagination of Jean Price-Mars, Dantes Bellegarde, Jacques Roumain, Jacques Stephen Alexis, etc. Similarly, Vodou has shaped the discourse on the intersections of memory, trauma, history, collective redemption, and Haitian diasporic identity in Haitian women’s writings such as in the fiction of Edwidge Danticat, Myriam Chancy, etc. The chapters in this collection tell a story about the dynamics of the Vodou faith and the rich ways Vodou has molded the Haitian narrative and psyche. The contributors of this book examine this constructed narrative from a multicultural voice that engages critically the discipline of ethnomusicology, drama, performance, art, anthropology, ethnography, economics, literature, intellectual history, philosophy, psychology, sociology, religion, and theology. Vodou is also studied from multiple theoretical approaches including queer, feminist theory, critical race theory, Marxism, postcolonial criticism, postmodernism, and psychoanalysis.

Haiti has long played an important role in global perception of the western hemisphere, but ideas about Haiti often appear paradoxical. Is it a land of tyranny and oppression or a beacon of freedom as site of the world's only successful slave revolution? A bastion of devilish practices or a devoutly religious island? Does its status as the second independent nation in the hemisphere give it special lessons to teach about postcolonialism, or is its main lesson one of failure? Haiti and the Americas brings together an interdisciplinary group of essays to examine the influence of Haiti throughout the hemisphere, to contextualize the ways that Haiti has been represented over time, and to look at Haiti's own cultural expressions in order to think about alternative ways of imagining its culture and history. Thinking about Haiti requires breaking through a thick layer of stereotypes. Haiti is often represented as the region's nadir of poverty, of political dysfunction, and of savagery. Contemporary media coverage fits very easily into the narrative of Haiti as a dependent nation, unable to govern or even fend for itself, a site of lawlessness that is in need of more powerful neighbors to take control. Essayists in Haiti and the Americas present a fuller picture developing approaches that can account for the complexity of Haitian history and culture.

"Rich in subject matter and eminently readable, this book is also a fine work of scholarship. The more than 1,200 footnotes are models of clarity and relevance; the bibliography and index seem scrupulously accurate. . . While each generation must rewrite its own history, as Nicholls remarks, no book on Haiti for a long time to come will properly be able to ignore the analysis he here provides." --Ethnic and Racial Studies "Step by step, Nicholls guides us through the various historical time periods of Haitian political and national development, illuminating each one of them by a cogent and learned discussion of the main ideas and ideologies that accompanied them." --The Political Quarterly "Probably the best book written about Haitian history after its independence . . . a thorough, thoughtful, extremely well-researched work." --Handbook of Latin American Studies In this lively, provocative, and well-documented history, David Nicholls discusses the impact of "color" on political and social alliances during almost two hundred years of Haitian history. While consciousness of racial identity has been a powerful factor which, from the earliest days, has united Haitians in a determination to preserve their national independence, color has been a divisive factor, leading to the erosion of the stability of that independence. Nicholls grounds this sophisticated analysis in great historical detail and engaging, witty prose. Students and general readers alike will gain much from this insightful and informative history of Haiti. A new preface to this edition covers the last ten years in Haitiain history. David Nicholls is a major authority on Haiti, and was in the country as a newspaper correspondent during the 1987 election disaster. His other books include Haiti in the Caribbean Context: Ethnicity; The Pluralist State: and Deity and Domination.