This series begins with a conversation between host Ellie Happel and nationally acclaimed and award-winning writer Edwidge Danticat. Danticat shares personal accounts from her childhood in Haiti, her experience emigrating to the U.S. in 1981, and her work and identity as an immigrant artist. Danticat arrived in the U.S. at a time when thousands of Haitians sought political asylum to escape the political persecution and extreme poverty of the Duvalier regime. The year 1981 also marked the beginning of the U.S. policy to detain immigrants arriving from Haiti and other parts of the world. The detention policy was widely challenged in a series of cases that culminated in Jean, the topic of episode two.
This series begins with a conversation between host Ellie Happel and nationally acclaimed and award-winning writer Edwidge Danticat. Danticat shares personal accounts from her childhood in Haiti, her experience emigrating to the U.S. in 1981, and her work and identity as an immigrant artist. Danticat arrived in the U.S. at a time when thousands of Haitians sought political asylum to escape the political persecution and extreme poverty of the Duvalier regime. The year 1981 also marked the beginning of the U.S. policy to detain immigrants arriving from Haiti and other parts of the world. The detention policy was widely challenged in a series of cases that culminated in Jean, the topic of episode two.