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Visiting SEC Scholar
February 18, 2016 @ 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Dr. Bertin M. Louis, Jr.
Visiting SEC Scholar
My Soul Is in Haiti: An Anthropologist’s Study of Protestant Culture,
Thursday, February 18, 3:00 pm Pugh 150
Historically, the majority of Haitians have long practiced Catholicism or Vodou. However, Protestant forms of Christianity now flourish both in Haiti and beyond. In the Bahamas, where approximately one in five people are now Haitian-born or Haitian-descended, Protestantism has become the majority religion for immigrant Haitians.
In his talk about In his new book My Soul Is in Haiti: Protestantism in the Haitian Diaspora of the Bahamas (New York University Press 2015), Dr. Bertin M. Louis, Jr., Vice Chair of Africana Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Africana Studies at The University of Tennessee, will discuss the research he conducted in the United States, Haiti, and the Bahamas that led to the publication of this ground-breaking text. Specifically, he will analyze why Protestantism has appealed to the Haitian diaspora community in the Bahamas. His talk will also illustrate how devout Haitian Protestant migrants in the Bahamas use their religious identities to ground themselves in a place that is hostile to them as migrants. The presentation also uncovers how their religious faith ties in to their belief in the need to “save” their homeland, as they re-imagine Haiti politically and morally as a Protestant Christian nation.
Dr. Bertin M. Louis, Jr. is Vice Chair of Africana Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Africana Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK), a 2015 UTK Quest Scholar of the week, a 2016 and a 2013 Southeastern Conference (SEC) Travel Grant Award recipient and a 2012 American Anthropological Association (AAA) Leadership Fellow.