Tous droits réservés. Republié avec l'autorisation du·de la détenteur·rice du droit d'auteur et de l'éditeur·rice, Le Nouvelliste.

Ce mémoire a pour but de comprendre et d’analyser les réalités des enfants en situation de domesticité en Haïti communément appelé restavèk. Cette pratique sociale s’explique par le fait que des parents qui sont en situation de pauvreté vont envoyer leurs enfants dans des familles aisées dans l’espoir qu’ils auront une vie meilleure. Ces enfants deviendront des domestiques qui vont accomplir des tâches pour lesquels ils ne seront pas ou très peu rémunérés.

Cet article brosse un portrait de la lutte féministe haïtienne pour souligner la journée nationale du mouvement des femmes haïtiennes, qui a lieu le 3 avril, marquant l’anniversaire de la grande manifestation pour la démocratie ayant réuni 30 000 femmes à cette date en 1986. L’auteure relate d’abord les avancées du mouvement féministe en Haïti depuis son essor durant la période de l’occupation militaire d’Haïti par les États-Unis jusqu’à l’instauration de la dictature des Duvalier, qui a étouffé le mouvement pendant près de trente ans par la répression.

This chapter discusses the transitional state of Haiti since the Duvalier regime, characterising the country as marked by a series of crises which continue to make the lives of Haitians extremely difficult. To understand the geopolitical stakes and the terms of the current issue, it is important to also understand the context of the situation. For some years now, almost all analytic texts on Haiti take as a point of departure the difficult junction of transition that the country has been experiencing, in fact, since the fall of the Duvalier dictatorship in February 1986.

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This article compares two protagonists from two different books of fiction: Marie Chauvet’s Colère and Émile Ollivier’s Mère-Solitude. The goal of this comparison is to fully understand the Vodou references that each character embodies, specifically as happy young women who begin to question the political context of their countries. The novels are set during the Duvalier regime and detail the unfortunate outcomes of each of the characters while subtly pointing out the atrocities of women’s conditions during that period of history. (Summary by Mouka)

In 1915, United States marines arrived in Haiti. Their landing signaled the beginning of an occupation that would cripple Haiti long after it ended in 1934. Scholars have offered compelling insights into African American opposition to the erosion of Haitian sovereignty. But this scholarship has prioritized the activism of Black men and male-dominated institutions while deemphasizing the complex reaction of Black women to the occupation. This article highlights that overlooked reaction. It shows that some leading Black women continued to speak of the need to civilize Haiti.

This article discusses the torturous conditions and suffering of enslaved men and women during the years of the French colony of Haiti before the French revolution of 1791. Boisvert focuses on the living conditions of female slaves and their different forms of resistance against their colonizers. The articles original contribution stems from and questions a biased historical neglect of racialized women as subjects of resistance and change during periods of revolution. (Summary by Mouka)

This text delves into the reformation of Haiti from 1874-1950 with a focus on African American women. Byrd explores how Black women used the African diaspora as a resource in the struggle for racial and gender equality and the conflict between elite and middle-class Black women abroad and Haitian women during Haiti’s reconstruction period. The essay draws attention to important questions in Black intellectual history by examining evolutions in the relationship between elite and middle-class Black women and Haitians from Reconstruction through the mid-twentieth century.

In this PhD. thesis, De Hoog extensively documents the Restavèk system in Haiti. She analyses the complex web of local gender dynamics within the global system of patriarchy, which, in the context of a violent post-colonial society, has had a significant impact on children’s safety. This thesis highlights the crucial part of women in this practice and the significance in the fact that the slaveholders of restavèk children are, for the large part, women.