Contrapuntal Reflections: Dominicans in the Haitian Imaginary

Abstract

Abstract In Haitian-Dominican Counterpoint (2003), Eugenio Matibag argues that the two nations of Hispaniola have developed a symbiotic relation largely ignored by scholars, who generally regard their rapport as solely conflictual. Matibag notes the responsibility of “state-sponsored” nationalist discourses in the buildup of centuries-old tensions that have shaped the sense of collective identity on the island. His close examination of the history of paninsular relations reveals a pattern of complementariness rather than competition, especially in economic terms. Matibag, however, offers a predominantly Dominican perspective on Hispaniola, as most evident in his discussion of the Haitian figure in Dominican literature. While the pivotal part played by Haitianness in the Dominican psyche has come under increasing scrutiny in recent scholarship, the analysis of the converse phenomenon has received far less attention. This article examines the symbolic role of Dominicanness in the Haitian literary imaginary. After a succinct recapitulation of common depictions of Haitianness in the Dominican imaginary and collective identity, followed by a survey of the gendered characterization of Dominicans in Caribbean writing and societies at large, this article briefly turns to Dominican representations in Edwidge Danticat’s “Between the Pool and the Gardenias” (1993) and The Farming of Bones (1998) and then to the portrayal of the Dominican specter that figures in Gary Victor’s A l’angle des rues parallèles (2003). Perhaps unexpectedly, these Haitian texts published around the turn of the millennium illustrate in many ways the complementariness and collaboration that Matibag regards as characteristic of paninsular relations on Hispaniola.