Author : J. Michael Dash
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 1349252190
Total Pages : 198 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (492 download)
Book Synopsis Haiti and the United States by : J. Michael Dash
Download or read book Haiti and the United States written by J. Michael Dash and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-07-27 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Imaginative literature, argues Michael Dash, does not merely reflect, but actively influences historical events. He demonstrates this by a close examination of the relations between Haiti and the United States through the imaginative literature of both countries. The West's mythification of Haiti is a strategy used to justify either ostracism or domination, a process traced here from the nineteenth-century until it emerges with a voyeuristic fierceness in the 1960s. In an effort to resist these stereotypes, Haitian literature becomes a subversive manoeuvre permitting Haitians to 'rewrite' themselves. The Unites States 'invented' Haiti as a land of savagery and mystery, a source of evil and shame. Weaving together text and historical context, Dash discusses the durability of these images, which continue to shape official policy and popular attitudes today.