Description
Book SynopsisMargaret Mitchell Armand presents a cutting edge interdisciplinary terrain inside an indigenous exploration of her homeland. Her contribution to the historiography of Haïtian Vodou demonstrates the struggle for its recognition in Haïti's post-independence phase as well as its continued misunderstanding. Through a methodological, original study of the colonial culture of slavery and its dehumanization, Healing in the Homeland: Haitian Vodou Traditions examines the sociocultural and economic oppression stemming from the local and international derived politics and religious economic oppression.While concentrating the narratives on stories of indigenous elites educated in the western traditions, Armand moves pass the variables of race to locate the historical conjuncture at the root of the persistent Haïtian national division. Supported by scholarships of indigenous studies and current analysis, she elucidates how a false consciousness can be overcome to reclaim cultural identity and prid
Trade ReviewArmand offers the first study of which . . . focus[es] on what she designates as the social (and racial) class/es of the 'Affranchi/bourgeois/elite,' and their often extremely private and/or secretive commitment to Vodou values. . . .Armand’s book resonates with Madelaine Hron’s work on storytelling and healing; Ren´e Lemarchand’s claims on the importance of 'reckoning' in the reconciliation process; and Patrick Bellegarde-Smith’s and Claudine Michel’s scholarship on the contemporariness of Vodou as a means to negotiate a new world order. For those readers unfamiliar with Vodou and working professionally with Haitian clients, the book is a thorough and concise introduction to a Vodou way-of-being; and for 'Haitianists,' Armand’s book. . . .offers a courageously self-reflexive look at the role of the elite, both historically and in the present, in edifying Haiti through a mise-en-oeuvre of a Vodou philosophy. * Nova Religio: The Journal Of Alternative And Emergent Religions *
Margaret Mitchell Armand’s seminal work demonstrates the necessity for continued scientific research on the legacy of the Taínos in order to showcase, to the rest of the World, the knowledge that the people of the Caribbean wanted to transmit to the conquistadors at the end of the fifteenth century for the good of humanity. -- Ginette Pérodin Mathurin, Senior Researcher and Coordinator, Haïtian Indigenous Research Center
Healing in the Homeland is a compelling Haitian story of conflict resolution and of decolonization. It is a narrative of the epistemological, ontological, pedagogical and psychological basis upon which to recreate and redeem a nation 209 years in the making. The tasks of creating a sovereign nation and people with a sovereign imagination and agency, made possible by the most radical modernizing revolution of the modern age, are not easy, entangled as they are in Western colonial dysfunctional culture and African marginality. Dr. Margaret Mitchell Armand, a dispute resolution specialist, has done well to weave a story of redemption guided by a conceptual/theoretical lens that is not only Haiti’s but for all peoples who were mired in colonial dystopia. -- Clinton Hutton, University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, Jamaica and author of The Logic & Historical Significance of the Haitian Revolution & the Cosmological Roots of Haitian Freedom
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Mèt Kafou: Master of the Crossroads Chapter 1: Loko Atisou: The Power of Knowing Chapter 2: Lenglensou: The Architects of the Inferno and the Victims Chapter 3: The Audacity of Faith Keeps the Drums Beating Chapter 4: The Poto Mitan of Decolonization: The Healing Process Chapter 5: Gran Bwa: The Power of a Single Story, Part I Chapter 6: Azaka Mede: The Power of a Single Story, Part II Chapter 7: Milokan: United We Are in the Realms of the Lwas Epilogue: The Gedes
