Getting ready to bat up!...for a trip to the Caribbean

I remember planning for my short study abroad trip to the Dominican Republic, January 9th to the 15th. The anticipation of a new culture, meeting people of different backgrounds, exploring new sites, and most importantly, getting away from the cold New York weather! (Beach I await thee!)

What I was mainly preparing myself for was the poverty and race issues that I was reading all about. Similar to the US with it’s Mexican border the Dominican Republic has the issue of handling immigration from Haiti and racism against the Haitians, or anyone who looks Haitians. From my understanding, at this point at least, not only are immigrants illegally crossing the border is an issue, but also the children already born in the country aren’t considered Dominican, not even politically! To make matters worse, a number of Haitians were deserted with no paperwork to count them as citizens or even work to help support families. As Jonathan Dimaio wrote in his article A Human Rights Crisis in the Dominican Republic,  

“lack of due process puts many Dominicans who should be legally protected from deportation at risk of being expelled from their birth country” and to make matters worse “Extremists' rhetoric and actions have incited international commentators to make blanket condemnations of the Dominican Republic as a racist country, frustrating and alienating many Dominicans who care deeply for their country, their fellow citizens, and that the migrants who live and work among them are treated fairly”. 

-Jonathan Dimaio 

Based off of what I read, the huge human rights issue is that Haitians in the Dominican Republic aren’t taken care of, are exploited for work, and are eventually left behind and forgotten, and left in poverty. Dominicans are assumed racists, and the government is left with no organized way to clean up any of this mess.

I find the historical background and economic origins of the racial issues in the Caribbean, or anywhere for that matter, to be of utmost importance. Tim Shenk and Alicia Swords’ article Dominican Republic Deportations and the Global Economy is a very eye-opening piece, discussing “the first European colony in the Americas, and [how] for centuries it served as a major entry point to the hemisphere for European immigrants, speculators, military expeditions and the Church” and the “invention of a racialized social hierarchy” to maintain control of the exploited Haitian, darker skinned, workers.

Now as much as I like to keep up with current events, I'm not much of a reader, so as insightful and enlightening as these article, and many others, are there's nothing like seeing it yourself. So enough with the lecture! Let me tell you all about my crash-course in the culture of the Dominican Republic!

Let the games begin!