Traces the author's journey as a Black Caribbean immigrant from Haiti to the United States. Describes the underlying factors that led to the author's relocation in the U.S. diaspora while at the same time examining the ways in which the author has been racially and linguistically positioned. The author further explains the negotiation of this position. The author's immigrant story is situated in the larger U.S. sociopolitical, linguistic, and racial context where immigrants, particularly immigrants of color, have faced many challenges.
Argues that Haiti must begin immediately to lay the foundations for a society that will improve significantly on that of the last two hundred years, that two of the critical groups in that process will be women and young professionals, and therefore that high quality human rights education is needed to assure their political, economic and professional empowerment.
Argues that neoliberalism carries out its agenda of privatization through public spaces that are never fully dismantled. Draws on empirical research into spaces that exemplify the usefulness of our reading of neoliberal privatization, including aspects of post-Katrina New Orleans and a more thorough case study of a pre- and post-earthquake Haiti and its highly privatized education system.