from legrace.benson@xxxxxxxxx
The posting from Mr. Leiderman and article by Tom Weiner reliable
reports so far as they go. Weiner also foregrounds the wisdom and heroic
diligence offered by Haitians in remote places such as Plaine Danger and
urban areas lush as Port-au-Prince, Jacmel or Cap Haitian. Some would
say that such indigenous wisdom and work have kept Haiti for Haitians
since 1804. We can decry the "evaporation" of revenues donated from
outside, but I see little effort on the part of donor-states or of those
who give to the many NGOs that go to "help Haiti" holding these
organizations to account. Note that I wrote "little". There needs to be
much more. When we write the checks or the remittances we need to know
how much of that goes to flights on rich nation airlines; to computers
and office supplies made outside Haiti --necessary expenses, but are
there alternative strategies?
It would be a pleasure to read on this list that such matters are
being seriously address and that the ways to help Haiti from outside are
true aid and not ways of foreign control of the country. There are
some, true enough. I hope to read here that there are more that we just
don't hear about in the news.
One correction to Weiner's article: the African heritage religion of
Haiti should be spelled with a capital, as is common for other faith
groups. Also the accepted spelling is VODOU. The word 'voodoo' is a
Hollywood neologism and is associated with films deliberately fashioned
to present Haiti as a nation of primitive savages in need to the
"civilizing" influence and control of the US. An increasing number of
newspapers, magazines, publishers and museums are revising their style
books to make sure their publications use the correct orthography.
KOSANBA, an organization for the scholarly study of Vodou has been
active in achieving this mark of dignity for an ancient, ecologically
sensitive, community centered religion with healing (in cooperation and
collaboration with contemporary medical practice) as a central mission.
Cheers,
LeGrace
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