Haiti: the real country and the dead end of nostalgia

At the crossroads of architecture, history, and critical thought, Daniel Élie, an architect and cultural heritage curator, offers an in-depth reading of Haiti’s territorial and social transformations. His text questions the persistence of the myth of return and refoundation in intellectual discourse, and calls for the development of new analytical categories capable of grasping the complexity of the contemporary country.

(I am writing these few lines following my participation in the ‘Jeudi du Territoire’ meeting held on March 26 by CIAT[1] on the regeneration of the Haitian rural space and after having watched, four days later, on tape, the interventions of a host of very well-informed panelists commenting on the possible ‘Renaissance'[2] of Haiti. Two events, same denominator: the myth of return.)