Welcome to Gentrified Port Au Prince.
Port Au Prince is the Capital of Haiti. To your left, you can see the entire city from a hotel in the hills of Port Au Prince. According to Norell Edwards, “Recent urban fiction imagines Port-au-Prince as a monstrous place, which aligns well with traditional noir aesthetics. In the Haitian literary imaginary, it has frequently been conceptualized as a symbol of the country's severe socioeconomic inequality, a space of migrancy, and an emblem of the government. Ultimately, the country's extreme inequality and migrancy are indications of the government's instability.” |
What is happening?
While these images are beautiful, each were taken ten years apart from one another. To the right, we can see the beautiful hills of Port Au Prince, along with beautiful upscale homes. This is a prime example of historical erasure. Traditionally, Port Au Prince is made up of smaller, colorful homes. With the building of "nicer" homes, it erases what was once part of Port Au Prince's culture. We know historical erasure can be harmful when we look at the Haitian Revolution. When colonizers came and tried to take over, it sparked a revolution that lead to Haiti being founded. While this looks good, the fight to keep what is rightfully the native Haitian people's is unnecessary. |