Haitian Studies Association

Online Film Screening – Ludi
2021 (80 minutes)
Date & Time: Friday, May 8th, 2026 at 1 p.m. EST/12 p.m. CT/ 10 a.m. PST

https://buff.ly/OqitIOS

Ludi follows a Haitian nurse employed at a nursing home in Little Haiti, Miami, trying to make ends meet to support her family in Haiti. The film helps viewers reflect on the cost of pursuing the so-called American Dream.

Join us for a post-screening discussion with filmmaker Edson Jean and Cécile Accilien (Professor of French & Francophone Studies, University of Maryland).

Online Films Screening – Four Short Films by Al’Ikens Plancher
Date & Time: Friday, April 24th, 2026 at 1 p.m. EST/12 p.m. CT/ 10 a.m. PST

https://www.haitianstudies.org/2026/03/four-short-films-by-alikens-plancher/

• Boat People, 2024 (10 minutes): Boat People is a black and white film inspired by the true story of a Haitian refugee woman in Guantanamo Bay trying to survive the inhumane conditions of the infamous detention camp.

• Tifi , 2021 (13 minutes): Ti Fi follows a young girl who decides to buy soccer shoes to play on a field ruled by bullies.

• La Vie, 2023 (4 minutes): La vie shows various periods in the life of a Haitian couple while on a beach in Miami.

• Konpa, 2023 (9 minutes): Konpa is the story of a young man in search of his Haitian roots in order to impress a girl.

Join filmmaker Al’Ikens Plancher and Felix Jean-Louis (Assistant Professor of History, University of California, Irvine) as they discuss these short films centered on Haitian and Haitian-American identities.

Upcoming Event: "Haiti Programs & Politics Briefing"

Thursday, April 2nd at 7:00 PM EST - Zoom

https://buff.ly/WApdZBT

The Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) is pleased to invite you to a Virtual Program Briefing on Thursday, April 2nd at 7:00 EST/4:00 PST with the leaders of our sister organization, the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI).

The Leadership Council members Mèt Kattia Dorestant Lefruy, Mèt Gesnel Pierre, and Mèt Chadony Canon will speak about the BAI’s work and provide analysis on the complex and challenging political context in Haiti. Bring your questions, the discussion is sure to be enlightening!

Latest issue of the Journal of Haitian Studies is now available for download to our members.

https://buff.ly/xiv6r3k

Online Film Screening – Douvan Jou Ka Leve (The Sun Will Rise)
by Gessica Généus
Date & Time: Friday, March 20, 2026 at 1 p.m. EST/12 p.m. CT/ 10 a.m. PST

https://buff.ly/MFtMTA0

Online Film Screening – Douvan Jou Ka Leve (The Sun Will Rise)
by Gessica Généus
Date & Time: Friday, March 20, 2026 at 1 p.m. EST/12 p.m. CT/ 10 a.m. PST

https://buff.ly/MFtMTA0

This intimate documentary by filmmaker Gessica Généus tackles the complex issue of mental health illness in Haitian society. Using her mother’s bipolar disorder, Généus explores what she refers to as an “illness of the soul” to examine how personal trauma is intertwined with centuries of cultural and religious colonization in Haiti. The film blends poetic narration with intimate footage in a way that invites viewers to address the issue of mental illness with compassion, care and understanding.

Yolette Williams, CEO of The Haitian American Alliance of New York (HAA), will join us after the film for a discussion with moderator Jaïra Placide (CUNY Haitian Studies Institute at Brooklyn College). A Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Licensed Psychotherapist, and Board-Certified Neurofeedback Specialist, Ms. Williams co-led annual medical and mental health missions to Haiti, including trauma counseling and training for professionals after the 2010 earthquake. The conversation will center on how mental health illness impacts Haitians and Haitian diasporic women in particular.

Call for Proposals: "Haitian Studies in Dialogue: Emerging Scholars Bridging Dyasporas in France, the United States, and Beyond"

A Pre-Conference Symposium

Presented by the Haitian Studies Association and the Haiti-DR Section of the Latin American Studies Association

Paris, France - May 25, 2026

https://www.haitianstudies.org/2026/02/haitian-studies-in-dialogue-a-pre-conference-symposium/

The Haitian Studies Association (HSA) and the Haiti-DR Section of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) are pleased to invite proposals from PhD students, early career researchers, and advanced (senior) scholars to participate in a one-day symposium to be held at the Paris Marriott Rive Gauche Hotel (14th arrondissement) on May 25, 2026 from 0900 until 1700.

The study of Haiti, like the country itself, is caught between colonial and neo-colonial currents. For nearly four decades the Haitian Studies Association, based in the United States academy, and its scholars have played key roles in defining Haitian Studies. U.S. regional hegemony has drawn Haitian migrants to its shores, increasing the number of people interested in the study of Haiti. This growth in scholarship focused on Haiti and Haitian diasporic communities is sustained and advanced by the formation of the Haitian Studies Association, the Haitian Studies Institute at Brooklyn College (New York), and the Journal of Haitian Studies. These institutions were born from activism and political organizing, but they also exist in relation to the historical legacies of Cold War-era area studies (1940s-1990s), and with the development of Black/Africana Studies departments from the 1960s onward. Haitian Studies in the United States, then, is a product of specific historical developments, local and state funding opportunities, and community-based socio-political mobilization, but it is also vital in this era of global crises. The United States’s continuing intervention in Haiti as well as its inhumane treatment of Haitian migrants and asylum seekers require ongoing response from experts to provide Haiti-informed perspectives.

Haitian Studies is a discipline in the United States academy, but, as a field, it exists beyond the United States as well. Historically, France served as the center of Haitian education and intellectual production for the 19th and 20th centuries and remains a vital hub for members of the diaspora. Because of U.S. American global reach, Haitian American production has dominated the landscape across the last half a century. The HSA has historically opened its doors to scholars based in France welcoming their membership and inviting them to meetings on the western shores of the Atlantic. In the spirit of decolonizing the academy we seek to transcend imperial boundaries by holding a meeting of Haitian scholars in France. We do so in order to expand the boundaries of our U.S.-centric scholarship, enlarge our academic lakou and engage in the practice of strengthening dyaspora connections. The question is not merely what Haitian Studies looks like outside the United States or how the discipline translates from the U.S. elsewhere. We ask, instead: what if we treat Haitian Studies as a field developed in dialogue in which its animating inquiries, axiomatic assumptions, and critical methodologies were forged in full acknowledgement of Haiti’s and Haitians’ diasporic conditions?

Brent Hayes Edwards reminds us that the work of forging diaspora necessitates attending to the differences of time and space, overcoming the divides of empire, and transcending the limits of language through a practice of décalage. With this call we intend to decenter HSA from its rootedness in the U.S. American academy and articulate its diasporic sensibilities with those “artificially separated” by the cleaves of empire. Following Edwards, we call for a dialogue that addresses and eclipses the fractures, tears, and tensions between Haitian Studies here and there, we ask: what might we achieve in that dialogue? What might we learn? Can Haitian Studies serve a purpose as a discipline of articulation through difference?

We accept proposals from scholars working on any topic that touches on Haiti and Haitian populations globally in any discipline – social and natural sciences, humanities, creative and expressive arts. We especially welcome applications from early career scholars and graduate students, particularly those who have had papers accepted at other HSA conferences but who were unable to attend due to visa or problems with funding. Papers and applications can be submitted in the language in which the applicant finds most comfortable presenting. Only complete applications received by March 20, 2026 will be considered.

Online Event: Kongrè Patrioyotik pou yon Sovtaj Nasyonal
'Atelier de restitution et de synthèse des résultats du Congrès sur les options de Gouvernance'

Date & Time: Jan 24, 2026 05:00 PM ET (Zoom)

https://buff.ly/LNLwn6P

Dear HSA Members,

At this difficult juncture for Haiti, we are forwarding an invitation to attend a zoom event Saturday January 24, 2026 hosted by the Congès National de Sauvetage National. For the past 10 months, the group has garnered opinions and suggestions through 12 symposia organized in Haiti and in the Diaspora. Follow-up meetings in Port-au-Prince, in the provinces, and in the Diaspora included different groups and constituencies representing various sectors of the population and often divergent platforms. A number of HSA members have participated as presenters or attendees. A report of the earlier work of the Congrès was included in the June 30, 2025 JOHS.

Tomorrow’s meeting is not about taking a particular political position. The Congrès intends to present various possible options for the transition suggested by these various groups and constituencies.

All are welcome at this public event. The attached summary of the Congrès’ findings and the link to register can be shared widely. Transparency is key.

Registration link: https://buff.ly/otyHe5Z

In solidarity and in hope of better days for Ayiti,

HSA Executive Committee

Global Reads Webinar: Author Nadine Pinede on her YA Novel Set in Haiti

https://uwm.edu/clacs/global-reads-webinar-author-nadine-pinede-on-her-ya-novel-set-in-haiti/

Global Reads Webinar: Author Nadine Pinede on her YA Novel When the Mapou Sings
K-12 educators, join us for a conversation with Nadine Pinede, author of the 2025 Américas Award Honor Book, When the Mapou Sings. Participants will have the opportunity to discuss the book with the author and consider classroom applications.

Infused with magical realism, this story blends first love and political intrigue with a quest for justice and self-determination in 1930s Haiti.

Sixteen-year-old Lucille hopes to one day open a school alongside her best friend where girls just like them can learn what it means to be Haitian: to learn from the mountains and the forests around them, to carve, to sew, to draw, and to sing the songs of the Mapou, the sacred trees that dot the island nation. But when her friend vanishes without a trace, a dream—a gift from the Mapou—tells Lucille to go to her village’s section chief, the local face of law, order, and corruption, which puts her life and her family’s at risk.

Forced to flee her home, Lucille takes a servant post with a wealthy Haitian woman from society’s elite in Port-au-Prince. Despite a warning to avoid him, she falls in love with her employer’s son. But when their relationship is found out, she must leave again—this time banished to another city to work for a visiting American writer and academic conducting fieldwork in Haiti. While Lucille’s new employer studies vodou and works on the novel that will become Their Eyes Were Watching God, Lucille risks losing everything she cares about—and any chance of seeing her best friend again—as she fights to save their lives and secure her future in this novel in verse with the racing heart of a thriller.

HSA Year in Review – Join the Konbit!

https://www.haitianstudies.org/2025/12/hsa-year-in-review-join-the-konbit/

This year the HSA konbit delivered impactful programming online and at our annual conference in Pittsburgh! We supported Haitian and Haitian diaspora actions including the Kongrè Patriyotik pou yon Sovtaj Nasyonal and KOSANBA 2025 at Nova Southeastern University. We do this together. Mèsi anpil to everyone who brought the following activities to life through their organization and participation.

Click the link above to learn about our accomplishments for the year.