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Considers how popular Haitian films not only provide entertainment but also help audiences in Haiti and the diaspora think through daily challenges.
In Haitian Creole, bay lodyans means to tell stories to an audience, and more generally, to entertain. This book is the first to analyze popular contemporary Haitian films, looking especially at how they respond to the needs and desires of Haitian audiences in and beyond Haiti. Produced between 2000 and 2018 and largely shot with digital cameras and sometimes cellphones, these films focus on the complexities of community, nostalgia, belonging, identity, and the emotional landscapes of exile and diaspora. They reflect sociopolitical and cultural issues related to family, language, im/migration, religion, gender, sexuality, and economic hardship. Using storytelling and other less traditionally "academic" techniques, Cécile Accilien advances Haitian epistemological frameworks. Bay Lodyans integrates terms and concepts from Haitian culture, such as jerans and kafou (derived from the French words for "to manage" and "crossroads," respectively) and includes interviews with Haitian filmmakers, actors, and scholars in order to challenge the dominance of Western theoretical approaches and perspectives.
"This book makes a significant contribution to Haitian studies, film studies, and Africana studies. Not only does it cover a topic that has not been addressed elsewhere—Haitian popular film—but it does so in an interdisciplinary way that accounts for the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality." — Régine Jean-Charles, author of Looking for Other Worlds: Black Feminism and Haitian Fiction
Acknowledgments
Preface
Introduction: Dèyè mòn gen mòn
1. Searching for Home: Im/migration, Deportation, and Exile in Dyaspora $100, Kidnappings, and Deported
Conversations about Home and Deportation with Rachèle Magloire
2. Language, Class, and Identity: Pale franse pa vle di lespri pou sa
Conversations about Language with Jacquil Constant and Rachelle Salnave
3. Representations of Religion: Protestant Views of Vodou in Madan Pastè a (1 & 2) and Matlòt (1, 2, & 3)
Conversations about Religion with Mario LaMothe and Anne François
4. Gender and Heteronormative Sexuality: Cousines, Facebook Player, and Gason
Conversations about Gender with Rachèle Magloire and Carole Demesmin
5. Navigating Same-Sex Desire: Fanm and Jere m Cheri
Conversations about Same-Sex Desire with Mario LaMothe and Anne François
6. Conclusion: Ayiti Nou Vle a (The Haiti We Want): Creating New Narratives for a New Haiti
Epilogue
Appendix 1. Film Titles in Haitian Creole and in French
Appendix 2. Film Titles Referring to Proverbs in French and in Haitian Creole
Appendix 3. Film Titles That Include Fanm and Gason
Appendix 4. Film Title Categories
Notes
Works Cited
Index