Neighbor-Homes : Julia Alvarez and Edwidge Danticat Write Hispaniola and the Diaspora

Abstract

Neighbor-Homes: Julia Alvarez and Edwidge Danticat Write Hispaniola and the Diaspora analyzes the work of two of the most acclaimed contemporary American and Caribbean authors for the first time in a single book. Extending beyond scholarly approaches to home as a theoretical construct, Neighbor-Homes considers how Alvarez and Danticat inaugurate multiple spaces of belonging for their off- and on-island fictional characters, for their diverse community of readers, and for themselves. Revealing a more complex and complete understanding of these Hispaniola-rooted authors, the project places Alvarez and Danticat into conversation at a time when the construction of a border wall and racist immigration laws confirm increasing anti-Haitian sentiment in the Dominican Republic. Neighbor-Homes incorporates correspondence between the two writers to extrapolate diverse narrative representations of Hispaniola and to highlight various themes central to their work and social justice platforms including family relationships, community building, neighbor aesthetics, statelessness, and border solidarity. Neighbor-Homes will help interdisciplinary audiences read Danticat and Alvarez with a more critical eye so that they can more adeptly and profoundly understand Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and their respective diasporas. This important study is an essential read for students and scholars of literature and social justice, cultural studies, history, and politics, as well as Caribbean, Latinx, and African diaspora literatures.