Ou Ayisyen? the Making of a Haitian Diasporic Community in Chicago, 1933-2010
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
OU AYISYEN? THE MAKING OF A HAITIAN DIASPORIC COMMUNITY IN CHICAGO, 1933-2010 BY COURTNEY S. CAIN DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2017 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee: Professor Emeritus James Barrett, Chair Associate Professor Erik McDuffie, Co-chair Professor Antoinette Burton Professor Flore Zéphir, University of Missouri ii Abstract This dissertation investigates the formation of the Haitian diaspora in Chicago over the twentieth century. Through original oral history interviews with key community leaders, analysis of Chicago-based newspapers, and previously unexamined organizational records, this is the first comprehensive study to look at the Haitian diaspora in Chicago. Chicago’s Haitian diaspora is different from the more recognized and studied Haitian diasporic communities in New York and Miami and other African diasporic communities for three reasons. First, Jean Baptiste Point DuSable, a fur trader believed to have been from Haiti, founded the city around 1780 which highlights the initial formation of Chicago as a diasporic space. Black women led the movement in Chicago to commemorate DuSable as the founder of the city and played a key role in building connections between Chicago and Haiti which shaped the formation of the Haitian community there. Secondly, the social class composition of Haitians who migrated to Chicago is unique because it is largely professional, educated, and middle class. Finally, the Haitian diaspora in Chicago is smaller and more decentralized than its counterparts in Miami and New York. Approximately 15,000 to 30,000 Haitian descendant people live in Chicago today, but this community does not live in a “Little Haiti,” a neighborhood comprised largely of Haitian immigrants. Instead, Haitians in Chicago are geographically dispersed across the city and its metropolitan area. The distinct historical, demographic, and spatial characteristics of Chicago influenced the ways that Haitians in the city forged community, interacted with other African descendant people, and cultivated transnational linkages to their Caribbean homeland over the twentieth century. iii Acknowledgements I was in the fourth grade when I fell in love with studying history. My teacher, Mrs. Doherty, assigned a group project where we had to reenact one of the events we learned about in our social studies class. I knew exactly what topic I wanted to do, and as soon as I got together with my group, I suggested we reenact the story about the lost colony of Roanoke. Ever since we read about the late sixteenth century English settlement that virtually disappeared, I could not stop thinking about what happened to those people. I wrote a play about the settlement, cast my groupmates into their various roles, and worked with them to come up with costumes to wear. The day for our presentation came, and I had butterflies in my stomach leading up to our turn. Everyone played their parts well, and once it came time to depict the disappearance of the settlers, I turned off all the classroom lights as my groupmates screamed and ran out of the room. I turned the lights back on and said dramatically, “And the settlers of Roanoke were never seen again.” My teacher and classmates erupted in applause as we all took our bow, and I smiled from ear to ear. For the rest of my elementary and high school education, I looked forward to my history classes and did well in them. By the time I got to college, I knew that I wanted to be a history major. My college courses opened my eyes up to the history of people who looked like me and the study of history: how historians research artifacts left behind and make an argument based on these artifacts. I realized that my fourth-grade play on Roanoke was my first foray into history as a practice: I did not know what happened to the settlement, but I used what I learned and developed an argument/conclusion based on the evidence (that the settlers were driven from the colony due to a catastrophic event). iv From the age of eight to the age of thirty and completing three degrees within the discipline of history, I am appreciative of my journey and the many people who helped me get here. First, I would like to thank my history teachers over the years for instilling a love of the past within me. Thank you to Mrs. Doherty, my fourth-grade teacher who gave me my first taste of being a historian, and Mrs. Clark, my eighth-grade teacher, who affirmed my interest in United States history. Thank you to my history teachers at Marian Catholic High School who introduced me to the art of writing persuasive historical essays. Thank you to my various college history professors, many of whom have mentored me over the course of my undergraduate and graduate tenure: Carol Symes, who taught my very first history class at Illinois and showed me the importance of performance in teaching; Dana Rabin, who led one of the best history classes I have ever taken (here’s to Artemisia!) and has been a kind and motivating voice ever since; Mark Leff, who is no longer with us but left a lasting impression on me after providing extensive feedback on my very first grad school paper while reassuring me that writing was an art form that we are always working on; Terry Barnes, whose seminar on black feminism often pushed me beyond my thinking limits but taught me that I could and should always think about things critically; and Clarence Lang, whose course on black social movements reinforced my love of history, especially black history, and whose encouragement has propelled me forward in ways he may never fully realize. To all the professors in the history department, the African American Studies department, and the Gender and Women Studies department at the University of Illinois, thank you for being a home to me over the last thirteen years and helping me get to this point. v Producing a dissertation involves the behind the scenes work of many people, and I want to thank them for their time, patience, and assistance with my project. Thank you to the archivists and staff at the Vivian Harsh Collection (including fellow Illinois alum, Tracy Robinson), the Chicago History Museum archives, the University of Chicago archives, and the Southern Illinois University Special Collections. Your help has been invaluable and integral to my success at the completion of this project. A special thank you to Mary Mallory at the University of Illinois library, who spent hours helping me wade through the census data on Chicago and Illinois to find out where the Haitians were. The entire staff at the University of Illinois library have been nothing but the best: from always having my stack of books ready for me to pick up at the Main Library to the archivists at the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, a sincere thank you for everything you do. Thank you to the staff in the Graduate College at Illinois, especially those in the Educational Equity Programs. Ave Alvarado and Daniel Wong, your mentorship and support since my first summer with the Summer Research Opportunities Program has been essential to my development personally and professionally. I am so appreciative of the both of you. A very big thank you to the staff in the History department, especially Tom Bedwell and Shannon Croft, who have taken care of me over the last seven years. I do not know what the department would do without everything you all do, and I am deeply appreciative for your work and hugs over the years! This dissertation is also the product of the community that I grew up in, the Haitian diaspora in Chicago. I am so lucky to have grown up in this tight knit and proud community and even luckier that they were so supportive when I told them that I was researching our history. Merci, thank you to all the oral history participants who shared vi their stories with me so generously. Thank you for being open and for suggesting other family and friends who would be willing to share their stories with me as well. Your voices are critical to this story, and I hope that I did you all justice. Thank you to the Haitian community in Chicago in general, for thriving and surviving over the years and providing me a rich history to tell. Again, I am deeply honored to be part of this diaspora and plan on continuing to share our story. This dissertation would also not have been possible without the support, encouragement, feedback, and love from my incredible committee members. Thank you to Flore Zéphir, a Haitian scholar who joined my committee from a different campus and provided the important scholarly knowledge Haitian communities. Flore, you are like family to me; your familiar accent and expertise has been so special to me over these last several years. I cannot thank you enough for serving on my committee. Thank you to Antoinette Burton, one of the examiners from my qualifying exams who started working with me after my first summer of graduate school. You are brilliant and inspiring as a successful woman in academia, and I am so grateful for your support. Thank you to Erik McDuffie, who modeled a passion for history and teaching that I had never seen before. From taking a class with you in college to being the co-chair on my committee, I can always count on you to critically engage my work, push me to be a better scholar, and remind me of the big picture.