Looking for Other Worlds: Black Feminism and Haitian Fiction

by Régine Michelle Jean-Charles

Overview

What would it mean to reorient the study of Haitian literature toward ethics rather than the themes of politics, engagement, disaster, or catastrophe? Looking for Other Worlds engages with this question from a distinct feminist perspective and, in the process, discovers a revelatory lens through which we can productively read the work of contemporary Haitian writers.

Régine Michelle Jean-Charles explores the "ethical imagination" of three contemporary Haitian authors—Yanick Lahens, Kettly Mars, and Evelyne Trouillot—contending that ethics and aesthetics operate in relation to each other through the writers’ respective novels and that the turn to ethics has proven essential in the twenty-first century. Jean-Charles presents a useful framework for analyzing contemporary literature that brings together Black feminism, literary ethics, and Haitian studies in a groundbreaking way.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813948454
Publisher:	University of Virginia Press
Publication date:	11/10/2022
Series:	New World Studies
Pages:	376
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.25(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Régine Michelle Jean-Charles is Dean’s Professor of Culture and Social Justice and Professor of Africana Studies and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Northeastern University and the author of Conflict Bodies: The Politics of Rape Representation in the Francophone Imaginary.

Table of Contents

Preface: The Art of Haitian Feminism
1. Haitian Women's Studies, Black Feminism, and Literary Ethics
2. Gran moun se moun: Aging and Intersectionality
3. The Ethical-Erotic: Sex and Intimacy
4. Geographies of Class Division: Class and Space
5. An Environmental Ethic: Land and Sea
Coda: A More Just and More Beautiful World

What People are Saying About This

Edwidge Danticat

In Looking for Other Worlds: Black Feminism and Haitian Fiction, Dr. Régine Michelle Jean-Charles examines the works of three contemporary Haitian women writers through rigorous scholarly analysis, as well as deeply personal reflections. Contextualizing these works within Haitian history and culture, literary ethics and Black feminism, Jean-Charles sheds much needed light on the complexity and virtuosity of these writers' oeuvres, and the vitality and potency of Haitian literature in general. Jean-Charles' own brilliant writing and thinking expertly guides us through this most refreshing, invigorating, nuanced, and thought provoking book.

Toni Pressley-Sanon

Well written and engaging, Looking for Other Worlds is the first study of its kind. It makes an original and substantial contribution to several fields, including Caribbean studies, women’s and gender studies, Africana studies, ethics, and environmental studies.

Editorial Reviews

Well written and engaging, Looking for Other Worlds is the first study of its kind. It makes an original and substantial contribution to several fields, including Caribbean studies, women’s and gender studies, Africana studies, ethics, and environmental studies.

Toni Pressley-Sanon

In Looking for Other Worlds: Black Feminism and Haitian Fiction, Dr. Régine Michelle Jean-Charles examines the works of three contemporary Haitian women writers through rigorous scholarly analysis, as well as deeply personal reflections. Contextualizing these works within Haitian history and culture, literary ethics and Black feminism, Jean-Charles sheds much needed light on the complexity and virtuosity of these writers' oeuvres, and the vitality and potency of Haitian literature in general. Jean-Charles' own brilliant writing and thinking expertly guides us through this most refreshing, invigorating, nuanced, and thought provoking book.

Edwidge Danticat