EMU Today

In the fall of 1989, as a student safely ensconced at a small liberal arts college in upstate New York, I learned the expression “Haitian Boat People.” It was a phrase used to describe the thousands of Haitian citizens who the US coast guard had intercepted as they made their way toward Florida in overcrowded, unseaworthy boats.  The labeling of people who were seeking refuge from violence in what they believed to be a safer neighboring country “boatpeople”, as if their condition was somehow their core identity, in fact dehumanized and Othered thousands of living souls who were only seeking what all of us seek: a safe place to land. What they received was anything but that. 

Wanting to understand the conditions people were fleeing, I decided to travel to Haiti. On my way to JFK Airport, I was warned by my taxi driver, a Haitian man, to be very careful about who I talked to and about what; a completely foreign concept for someone who was from “the land of the free.” When I arrived in the tiny island nation a few hours later, rather than a sense of surveillance and repression that I was warned about, I found a country of people who had recently, for the first time in its history, elected its president. He was a man of the people, a former priest named Bertrand Aristide whose political party was aptly named Lavalas (The Flood). There was genuine joy in the air, a sense of hope, communalism, and community care. 

This deep adherence to communalism is something that is endemic to Haiti, not the violence and chaos that is central to the deleterious narrative spun by the international community. This narrative has its origins in Haiti’s taking of its independence in 1804 at a time when the US, just 400 miles away, was still building its wealth from slavery and colonialism.  

In 1990, when Haitian people were truly able to put someone of their choosing in the palace--someone who they felt represented their values as an independent nation--yes, they were still “poor” by American consumerist standards, but they were also free, dignified, human beings. Eight months later, backed by arms supplied by the United States, there was a coup. By then I was living in Haiti and decided to stay even after US president, George W. Bush, advised all Americans to leave. I’m not suggesting that others follow that path. But there is something to be said for resisting the dominant narrative around Othered peoples. I witnessed first-hand, how people with very little basic resources like light and clean water worked together to help each other survive with humanity and dignity. 

Haiti is again in a heightened state of crisis and Haitian people are again, seeking refuge in the United States, a country that has never welcomed them. We can, for simplicity’s sake date the beginning of the current crisis to the assassination of Haiti’s president, Jovenal Moïse in 2021. According to the Wilson Center, in the years since Moïse’s assassination “the security situation in Haiti continues to deteriorate, with gangs reportedly controlling over 80% of the capital. Violence and kidnappings are at record levels. In addition, Haitians continue to risk their lives to reach the United States.” 

Those of us who know this more recent history will be reminded of journalist photos of “Haitian Boat People” from the 1990s. We may also recall the photos of Del-Rio, Texas border patrol officers on horseback wielding what appeared to be whips to corral Haitian migrants on the border of Mexico seeking US asylum 2021. The question that NPR reporter Bill Chappell posed at the time was about “how a ‘nation of immigrants’ treats people who are desperate for a better life.”

On Tuesday, April 16^th Dr. Maria-José Garcia Oramas, a researcher in the Department of Psychology with a focus on Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Mexico, Xalapa-Veracruz gave a lecture entitled “Haitian Migration and Intersections of Race, Class, and Gender in Mexico.” During the lecture, which was well-attended by EMU students and faculty, Professor Oramas provided an overview of the long history of African presence in Mexico, noting that the Afro-Mexican presence has only recently been acknowledged by the Mexican government in 2019. She then narrowed her focus to discuss the large number of foreign migrants who pass through Mexico on their way to seeking asylum in the United States before discussing the specific conditions of Haitian people seeking refuge in Mexico City as they await word of approval for asylum in the US. Although the conditions of Haitian people living in refugee camps for months at a time is dire, Dr. Oramas stressed at the end of the lecture, that Haitian people mine their communal spirit to share what little aid and resources they have and, in this way, claim their humanity and dignity under inhumane conditions. 

Despite being driven from their island home by violence, they nonetheless, kenbe fèm (hold on tight) to themselves and to each other.