Moving Forward, Looking Back: Promising New Directions in Hispaniola Studies

Session Submission Type: LASA Section Roundtable

Abstract

In the past ten years, the field of Hispaniola Studies has grown considerably, both in sheer numbers of new scholars and in directions of research interests. Scholarly publications – from articles to monographs to anthologies – have stressed the centrality of the island to larger understandings of a myriad of topics, not least of which include migration and diaspora, race and nation, neocolonialism and authoritarianism, and national memory and identity. This roundtable, composed of early graduate career students, presents a compelling glimpse into a number of these new directions from a cohort of young scholars energized to further push research on the island also known as “Ayti” and “Quisqueya” from the margins to its rightful center within both Caribbean and Latin American studies. For some scholars, this work has meant pushing to connect the two sides of the island through migration, shared histories, and solidarity; for others it has been respective nationally-focused work that is constructed around larger global questions. In both cases, this new work demands an accounting for the silences and imagining new narratives for Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Hispaniola. Through an engagement with up-and-coming scholars who are at the forefront of new research, this roundtable will offer not only a glimpse into the future of research on Hispaniola, but also provide fertile ground for on-going discussions of what that future of Hispaniola studies could (and should) look like.

Sub Track

• Section Sessions

Session Organizers

• Elizabeth S Manley, Xavier University

• Karen E Richman, University of Notre Dame

Chair

• Brendan Jamal Thornton, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Discussant

• Diego I Ubiera

Presenters

• Rene Cordero

• Narcisa M Núñez, University at Albany, SUNY

• Alexa Rodriguez, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Shanna Jean-Baptiste, Yale University

• Ruben Luciano

• Bianca Dang, Yale University, PhD student

• Emmanuel Lachaud, Yale

• Felicia Denaud, Brown University