Teaching Haiti Beyond Literature: Intersectionalities of History, Literature and Culture

Call for Papers for edited anthology:

Teaching Haiti Beyond Literature: Intersectionalities of History, Literature and Culture 

CFP deadline: 500 word abstract due by 25 June 2016; Full draft due by 10 January 2017

In “Poem for the Poorest Country in the Western Hemisphere”, poet Danielle Legros Georges chants: “Oh poorest country, this is not your name/ You should be called beacon, and flame.” Haiti, the only country with the last name of “poorest country in the Western hemisphere” is often at the crossroads of either been venerated in History as the First Black Republic or being pitied. Latin American historian Philippe Zacaïr notes that Haiti is “only respected in books as opposed to real life.” The essays in this volume will focus on how to teach about Haiti and its complex history and culture from a transdisciplinary perspective. Its main goal is to provide best practices and practical suggestions for teaching about Haiti from multiple lenses including art, art history, cultural studies, film, gender, history, literature, and sociology to name but a few areas of interest. The volume also seeks critical essays that center on “Fatal assistance” (a term used by filmmaker Raoul Peck) to highlight the problematic of humanitarian aid and NGOs, service learning, volunteerism and disaster tourism in Haiti.

Since the 2010 earthquake that reshaped Haiti forever, there has been an increased interest in Haiti. The mythologization of the Haitian revolution remains a constant trope for writers and critics in the Americas. Yet, paradoxically, the Latin American Studies curriculum in U.S. universities often disregards Haiti. Anthropologist Michel Rolph Trouillot in his seminal work Silencing the Past challenges the “production of historical narratives” and how they affect our understanding and perception of history and culture. When referencing countries in Latin America, Haiti is positioned at the very bottom, so it is not surprising that in spite of being the first independent black country in the Western Hemisphere, there has been almost complete erasure of its history. An example of Haiti’s marginalization in the Caribbean is its complex rapport with the Dominican Republic. Recently, Haiti as well as the Dominican Republic have been in the news because of issues associated with citizenship. In 2013, the Supreme Court of the Dominican Republic ruled that anyone born between 1929 and 2010 to non-citizen parents could not claim Dominican citizenship and was therefore subject to deportation.

In the recent years of the post-Haiti earthquake, there have been several volumes published in English which focus on Haiti’s history and culture as well as comparative studies of Haiti and other Caribbean islands. Among them we note the following: Humanitarian Aftershocks in Haiti by Mark Schuller (Rutgers University press, 2016), The Haitian Declaration of Independence edited by Julia Gaffield (University of Virginia Press, 2016), Place in the Sun: Haiti, Haitians and the Remaking of Quebec by Sean Mills (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2016)), Why Haiti Needs New Narratives: A Post-quake Chronicle by Gina Athena Ulysse (Wesleyan University Press, 2015), Caribbean Crossing: African Americans and the Haitian Emigration Movement by Sara Fanning (New York University Press, 2015), Tropical Apocalypse: Haiti and The Caribbean End Times by Martin Munro (University of Virginia Press, 2015), Haiti: The Aftershocks of History by Laurent Dubois (Metropolitan Books, 2012), From Sugar to Revolution: Women’s Vision of Haiti, Cuba and the Dominican Republic by Myriam Chancy (Wilfred Laurier University Press, 2012) and Haiti and the Haitian Diaspora in the Wider Caribbean edited by Philippe Zacaïr (University Press of Florida, 2010)

Despite these very impressive volumes, no comprehensive reader proposing methods for teaching about Haiti’s history and culture from transdisciplinary perspectives has been published. This book will fill this gap. The essays will provide practical tips and best practices for instructors teaching about Haiti as well as suggested readings for undergraduate and graduate students at the MA level.

We are looking for unpublished essays focusing on teaching about Haiti from the following perspectives (This list is not exhaustive):

  • Activism/Activist in Haiti
  • Haitian History
  • Haitian Painting
  • Haitian Women
  • Haitian Immigrant
  • Haitian Film
  • Haitian Music
  • Historical Representations of Haiti
  • Indigenism Movement
  • Haitian Architecture
  • Humanitarianism/Humanitarian aid/NGOs
  • Service Learning in Haiti
  • Haitian Literature and Poetry (especially lesser known writers from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries)
  • Haitian Creole (Link between language and education/language and development)
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • Haiti and the Dominican Republic
  • Haiti and the United States
  • Haiti/Haitians and African-Americans (beyond Jacques Roumain and Langston Hughes)
  • Vodou as cultural practice (religion, culture and identity)
  • Haitian Poetry
  • Haitian Theater
  • Post-earthquake
  • LGBTQ in Haiti

If you are interested in contributing, please send a 500 word abstract and short bio to Dr. Cécile Accilien and Dr. Valérie K. Orlando at either: cecileaccilien@ku.edu or vorlando@umd.edu by 25 June 2016. You will be notified by 15 July 2016. The first draft of the essays will be due by 10 January 2017.

About the editors:
Cécile Accilien is Associate professor in the Department of African & African-American Studies and the Director of the Institute of Haitian Studies (haitianstudies.ku.edu) at Kansas University. Valérie Orlando is Professor of French & Francophone Literatures and Cultures at the University of Maryland (College Park), Head of the Department of French & Italian and Series Editor for: “After the Empire: The Francophone World and Postcolonial France”, Lexington Books

Above adapted from emailed announcement.