Economic Interests Are Color-Blind: On Class Divisions in Haitian History

Abstract

In Haiti, foreigners are often called ‘blan!’. The unknown person is identified in the simplest possible way. He does not even have to be white. Haitians often refer to each other as nèg. This sounds strange for those not used to it. In the worst case, they interpret it, wrongly, as derogatory. But nèg simply means ‘man’ or ‘hey, you!’ Nèg, however, also means black, as opposed to blan or milat. Skin color has never been registered in Haitian censuses, but the overwhelming majority of all Haitians are black. Less than 10 percent are mulattoes, and then there are less than a thousand Levantines — Palestinians, Lebanese, and Syrians — who arrived in Haiti toward the end of the nineteenth century and at the beginning of the twentieth, and who have mainly married within their own group.