This chapter traces the growth and development of the field of Haitian Studies over the past three decades, marking the end of the Duvalier dictatorship, the founding of the international Haitian Studies Association, KOSANBA (Congress of Santa Barbara), and the Journal of Haitian Studies, the 2004 bicentennial of Haiti’s revolution, and natural disasters including the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti. These events impelled scholarly production and critiques within Haiti and the Haitian diaspora, bringing attention to the profound legacies of the Western Hemisphere’s first black republic. Contemporary Haitian Studies scholars, calling for “new narratives” about Haiti, reject unjust representations of Haiti in popular culture and the international media, and critique problematic racial terminology including the trope of “mulatto” or mixed-race historians. Ongoing scholarship addresses women’s rights, gender-based violence, the role of foreign intervention and NGOs in Haiti (disaster capitalism), community development organizations, the problem of detention/incarceration of Haitian migrants to the U.S., and the emergence of a Haitian community in Brazil (after 2010). Undergirding the rise of Haitian Studies is the active promotion and development of Haitian Kreyòl alongside research on the Vodou religion and spiritual practices. This chapter also briefly discusses cultural production by major figures including Frankétienne, Edwidge Danticat, and Edouard Duval-Carrié.

Past, Mariana “Haitian Studies Rising.” In Routledge Handbook of Afro-Latin American Studies, edited by Bernd Reiter and John Antón Sánchez, 468- 477. New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2023.

Mariana Past is a professor of Spanish at Dickinson College.

For more information on the published version, visit Routledge's Website. https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Handbook-of-Afro-Latin-American-Studies/Reiter-Sanchez/p/book/9780367691431#

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