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Archive for the ‘Public Forums’ Category
08.24.11
Check out this event that has been co-sponsored by Haiti Cultural Exchange and City College of New York!
Mama Lola and Donald Cosentino will discuss the transformations of Vodou in the 20th and 21st centuries as they relate both to local and more complex global networks of practices.
Marie Thérèse Alourdes Macena Champagne Lovinski, better known as Mama Lola, is a Brooklyn-based healer whose practice, based in Haitian Vodou, combines the “skills of a medical doctor, a psychotherapist, a social worker, and a priest”. Mama Lola has become a world-renowned healer who still works out of her home in Brooklyn, but also travels both to heal and to teach about the religion. Recently, she has become an important voice in the Vodou festival sponsored each year by Vodou Authentica in New Orleans.
Donald Cosentino is Professor of World Arts and Cultures at the University of California-Los Angeles. His research interests include Black Atlantic oral narrative traditions, myths, rituals and popular cultures. He has done extensive fieldwork in Nigeria (1966-68; 1976-78), Sierra Leone (1972-3; 1983), Haiti (1986-present) and Los Angeles (1979-present). He is the author of Defiant Maids and Stubborn Farmers: Tradition and Invention in Mende Story Performance (Cambridge UP, 1982) and Vodou Things: The Art of Pierrot Barra and Marie Cassaise (University of Mississippi Press, 1998). He was the curator, editor and chief writer for the award winning project, “The Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou” at the American Museum of Natural History (1995-99), and for “Divine Revolution: the Art of Edouard Duval-Carrie” (2004). As a Guggenheim Fellow (2006), Cosentino completed fieldwork for Chasing the Dead, a book he is writing on Afro-Angeleno Spiritism. Cosentino is also curating a major exhibition entitled “In Extremis: Death and Life in 21st Century Haitian Art,” scheduled to open at the UCLA Fowler Museum in fall 2012.
A third edition of Karen McCarthy-Brown’s Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn:
In 1991, Karen McCarthy-Brown, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Drew University, published Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn, which received the Victor Turner Award from the Society of Humanistic Anthropology, as well as the Best First Book in the History of Religion from the American Academy of Religion. Stephanie May writes that the work that Karen McCarthy-Brown and Mama Lola did together on the book “has crossed boundaries in the study of religion, anthropology, and women’s studies”. Claudine Michel’s new foreword to the third edition of Mama Lola (2011), honors the original iteration of the book, McCarthy-Brown herself, and the work that Mama Lola has done in healing processes of a post-earthquake Haiti and its relationship to the Americas. To contribute to a project to honor McCarthy-Brown’s work please visit: Honoring Karen McCarthy-Brown’s work.
Date: Monday, September 12, 2011
Time: 7PM
RSVP:
We prefer that you RSVP. Your RSVP will help facilitate security. Also, we expect that the event will fill-up quickly. If you are learning about this event at the last minute, please feel free to come, and we will do our best to accommodate you, but we cannot guarantee seating if the event fills up. Please RSVP at abenedicty@ccny.cuny.edu or (212) 925-6625, ext 207. Please bring a valid picture i.d.
Location:
Division of Interdisciplinary Studies at the Center for Worker Education
The City College of New York
25 Broadway, 7th floor (in front of the bull statue at Wall Street)
New York NY 10004
(212) 925-6625, ext 0
Subways: 4 or 5 to Bowling Green; R or 1 to Rector Street; J or Z to Broad Street
Check out the event webpage here for more details!
Posted in HCX Collaborations, Public Forums | No Comments »
08.10.11
Photo Credit: Tequila Minsky
On July 27th, HCX and its members and friends met at Colors Restaurant in Manhattan for our monthly An n’ Pale | Café Conversations. The room buzzed as we ordered off the interesting happy hour menu and awaited the start of the evening. In the corner booth, sitting inconspicuously next to a pile of books for sale was our featured guest. Hervé Lemoine is a very interesting character. His pepper grey hair and long, quiet smile give him an air of thoughtfulness, but his ideas expose a person and a people torn by the conflicting and lost stories of Haiti. Lemoine’s book, Face à Face autour de l’Identite Haïtienne (2009), created a startling and controversial image of the modern Haitian.
“You are Haitian if Haiti is in you.” Lemoine pointed to the ability and the necessity for Haitian culture to be taught. The resulting value of these lessons and appreciation of the culture becomes “Haitian-ness.” In this way, Haiti isn’t necessarily a birthright or a title to bestowed, it becomes a mentality.
But the internal conflicts of this mentality as a result of French colonial rule and the remnants of a plantation system that was later perpetuated by Haitian culture has created the walking contradiction that Hervé eventually realizes himself as.
Commentary on his medium language of choice was particularly interesting. When asked why, if the book was written for Haitians and to Haitians, was it written in French, a language that alienates the entirety of Haiti’s large illiterate population and distances others who speak little or no French. Lemoine viewed this as a battle of propriety. Admitting that the intellectual community in Haiti feels uncomfortable writing and even reading Kreyol, it didn’t seem to make sense to express his ideas in a language that didn’t offer him real access to his target audience.
From what I have read so far, Hervé’s writing is interesting and political as it delves into the depths of identity search. There is a tone of anger and urgency in Lemoine’s writing and occasionally voice. But one that seems to seek out the chaff in hopes of burning it away and leaving the kernel of truth so that it might grow into something substantive, powerful, and decidedly Haitian at heart.
Check out a photo archive of the event here. Photos courtesy of the fantastic Tequila Minsky.
Posted in Archive, Literature, Public Forums | No Comments »
05.31.11
Photo Credit: Tequila Minsky
Last night was An n’ Pale |Café Conversations with Yves “Fanfan Ti Bot” Joseph, and I think it’s safe to say that he brought the party. Through his humorous anecdotes of life with Tabou Combo, Haiti’s oldest Konpa band, we listened to the progress of a young aspiring soccer player with a knack for the conga into the established manager and vocalist of an internationally acclaimed band. Joseph explained the importance of the politics of maintaining a multinational, cross-generational band and the obstacles that they present but emphasized the necessity of musical evolution.
“I mean, listen to ‘Juicy Lucy.’ That was not Konpa anymore. That was funk.”
The changes in the international and Caribbean music scene were also brought up. The non-Haitian or Caribbean populations that appreciate Konpa music have grown and the composition of audiences is definitely changing. Joseph pointed to the necessary stylistic changes Tabou has had to make in order to entertain their adoring fans. Shorter songs, slower beats, and the multilingualism of their songs lyrics all lend themselves as methods of reaching their new and loving audiences. But as questions and opinions rolled in from the audience, it became apparent that the racial and cultural differences in experience of Konpa music permeated the setting. Many found that concerts were often black dominated or rather that when people of color appear, people (a hem) “without” color disappear. Fanfan found this to be quite a generalization and that it had more to do with cultural time differences and changing audiences than to do with race. He found that many Americans aren’t as familiar with the unstructured manner in which Konpa concerts are presented such as late start times and all-night sets which perhaps the 4am Panamanian crowds might jive to.
A self-professed rock & roll fan, Joseph professed his love for the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and even went so far to call himself a “‘Stones head” and a lover of Jay-Z to the humored delight of the audience. Joseph finds the power of music is in the lyrics and that rock music combines both the depth in lyrics with the presence of real instruments, another essential characteristic of great music.
Fanfan is a storyteller, and the stories he has to tell were personal, telling, and real. They told the story of “not just a Haitian band but a band made by Haitians playing music for the rest of the world.” Thanks, Fanfan. Thanks, Tabou. Keep up the great music.
-Kassandra Khalil, HCX Development Intern
Posted in Archive, HCX Programs, Music, Public Forums, Uncategorized | No Comments »
05.10.11
Nadege Fleurimond is indeed a fantastic young woman. Her zeal for cooking and Haitian culture really shone through as Fleurimond explained her process of integrating Haitian flavors and technique into her all-cuisine catering company. Her refusal to negotiate taste and quality in favor of marketability has undoubtedly led to her success. Nadege’s weekly cooking parties and the intimate social settings they have provided are a highlight of her culinary career. Food as a unifier of all people was the theme of the night; this was proven true while guests shared plates brimming with savory steak, saucy mussels and beautiful salads off the Color’s Restaurant menu. Nadege also discussed the work of her non-profit organization, Young Culinary Masters, which teaches youth healthy eating habits and cooking techniques in order to help combat America’s high rates of childhood obesity and subsequent health hazards such as Type 2 Diabetes.
Near the end of the discussion, we heard an excerpt from Taste of Life. Fleurimond’s recently published book is a thoughtfully written compilation of recipes coupled with their personal significance.
The evening’s discussion ended with a food demonstration. Nadege prepared blanc manger or “white food,” a favorite traditional Haitian desert of chopped fruit in a light custard sauce with a hint of Cremas, a sweet alcoholic liqueur.
Here’s the recipe, try it out!
Blanc Manger
1 quart sour cream
1 can of condensed milk
4 cups of various fresh chopped fruit
½ cup of Cremas or to taste
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
Mix ingredients together in a large bowl. Serve immediately or chill in refrigerator until ready to serve. Sneak sips of Cremas when no one is paying much attention. Enjoy!
Special thanks to Colors Restaurant, our gracious hosts for the evening.
Posted in Archive, HCX Programs, Public Forums, Uncategorized | No Comments »