Finding My Cultural Identity: Experience from a “Dyaspora” in Haiti's Internally Displaced Persons Camps

Abstract

My experience in Haiti was remarkable, life changing, as well as challenging. Out of a group of five students, it is fair to say that I was one of the most nervous and apprehensive of them all. Having never been to Haiti, I fell victim to the socially accepted stereotype of Haiti as a dangerous, uninhabitable country. Being convinced of this negative perception, I was expecting to enter a war zone and witness only the depressing images of poverty that the media displays when showing Haiti. Fortunately, my experience proved my preconceived notions wrong; being in Haiti allowed me to witness the country's richness in culture and history as well as its significance in the world. Although Haiti is close to America geographically, it does not share the same cultural aspects as does the United States. It is culturally quite different. These differences have led to Haiti having produced a large body of anthropological scholarship, primarily because of its unique history. It has therefore played a large role in sociocultural anthropology that, in turn, has had a significant impact on my anthropological training. I can therefore say that the major distressing events that struck Haiti, such as the earthquake and all other events that helped make it an impoverished country, need an area of study like anthropology to help comprehend how and why a country like Haiti is where it is today.

The Conflicts of Crisis: Critical Reflections on Feminist Ethnography and Anthropological Activism

“…However, I am without power-without the resources to be able to really address the change often demanded of me by people in Haiti. My strategies may not be necessary for anthropologists whose activism is primarily among people with whom they share an identity-although, as my students discovered in the summer of 2011, being of and from Haiti implies a different level of access and privilege than coming from Haiti's Diaspora (e.g., Bernard 2013). As I have detailed elsewhere (Schuller 2010(Schuller , 2012, my motivations to work in Haiti sprang out of campus activism and, later, from being laid off as a full-time community organizer.…”

Beyond poto mitan: Challenging the “Strong Black Woman” archetype and allowing space for tenderness

“…The discussion evolved into the appropriateness of various frames for understanding our fieldwork, and from there the question of who the most appropriate researcher is to interpret and discuss these frames. The conversation was productive, if at times painful, bringing up issues of authenticity, reflexivity, “science,” as well as the fraught and fragmented claims to being “Haitian” for researchers from the “Dyaspora” (Bernard 2013). In many ways, researchers from Haiti's “middle” classes mainly from Port‐au‐Prince were also forced to confront their social distance from moun andeyò, “outsiders,” highlighting the need to deconstruct methodological nationalism and essentialist understandings of what it means to be “Haitian.” Simply collaborating with colleagues in the country is not sufficient for decolonizing research, as it can leave intact hierarchies within the country.…”

“Maintaining hope for a better future”: An interview with Dr. Crystal Felima

“…Diaspora, I am; however, Haitian, I do not know if I am. Sometimes, I heard, “Oh yeah, you're not necessarily Haitian because you are from the United States” (see also Bernard, 2013; Semé, 2013). So, I say in terms of individual and collective stories, I privilege both because I can learn about the macro and micro‐structures that shape risk and people's experiences.…”