Teaching About Haiti - Social Justice Books

All too often in the midst of the reporting on Haiti, we hear that the country is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. Seldom do students learn about the long history of U.S. involvement in Haiti which has directly contributed to that poverty and challenges today. Nor do they learn that Haiti's revolution of independence was the only one in the western hemisphere to result in freedom from tyranny for ALL people. We offer here children's and YA books to fill the gaps in the media and curriculum. We welcome additional suggestions.

Visit the Teaching for Change site for more resources to teach about Haiti.

Titles that we recommend are featured below. The ones with reviews are noted with an asterisk (*). Some titles are recommended with a caveat.

Elementary | Middle School | YA/ Adult Fiction | YA / Adult Nonfiction

Black History Month provides a key opportunity to launch this study. Haiti was the only nation in the western hemisphere to end slavery when it declared independence -- therefore the only nation to ensure true independence for all people.

Just as the study of Black History should be year round, so can our study of Haiti. For example, Professor Madison Smartt Bell suggests that "The Haitian Revolution, though seldom studied in proper detail outside Haiti, ought to be found near the center of any basic curriculum of American History."

Elementary

By Francie LaTour, Ken Daley (Illustrator)

By LaTisha Redding, Aaron Boyd (Illustrator)

By Karen Lynn Williams

The Deep Past of Haiti*

By Jubilee School's 2013 fifth and sixth grade class

By Edwidge Danticat

By Tami Charles

By Jesse Joshua Watson

By Danielle Joseph and Olivier Ganthier (Illustrator)

By Elizabeth Turnbull, Mark Jones (Illustrator), Wally Turnbull (Translator)

By Edwidge Danticat, Edouard Duval-Carrie (Illustrator)

Mama’s Nightingale: A Story of Immigration and Separation*

By Edwidge Danticat, Leslie Staub (Illustrator)

By Tami Charles and Sara Palacios (Illustrator)

By Denize Lauture, Reynold Ruffins

By Youme Landowne

By Walter Dean Myers

By Lyrica Fils–Aimé and Cedrick Bijou

Middle School

By Edwidge Danticat

By Dana K. Vincent (Editor), Keith Hefner (Editor), Laura Longhine (Editor)

By Roge

By Diane Wolkstein

By Edwidge Danticat

By Ann E. Burg

By Frances Temple

Tonight, by Sea

By Frances Temple

OUT OF PRINT

By Marie Arnold

YA / Adult Fiction

American Street*

By Ibi Zoboi

By Roxane Gay, Nicole Gay (Photographer)

By Guy Endore, Michel-Rolph Trouillot (Afterword by), David B. Gaspar

By Edwidge Danticat

By Anne Gallin (Editor), Ruth Glasser (Editor), Jocelyn Santana (Editor)

By Edwidge Danticat

By Edwidge Danticat

By Lenelle Moise

By Laura Rose Wagner

By Edwidge Danticat

By Myriam J. A. Chancy

By Marie Vieux-Chauvet, Rose-Myriam Rejouis (Translator), Val Vinokur (Translator)

By Jacques Roumain

By Paul Laraque (Editor), Jack Hirschman (Editor), Boadiba (Translator)

By Nadine Pinede

YA / Adult Nonfiction

By Maurice Jackson (Editor), Jacqueline Bacon (Editor)

By Paul Farmer

By Laurent DuBois

By C. L. R. James

By Brandon R. Byrd

By Edwidge Danticat

By Edwidge Danticat

By Jonathan M. Katz

By Gerald Horne

By Peter Hallward

By Anne Gallin (Editor), Ruth Glasser (Editor), Jocelyn Santana (Editor)

By Myriam J. A. Chancy

By Noam Chomsky, Paul Farmer, M.D., Amy Goodman

By Michel-Rolph Trouillot

By James Ridgeway

By Toussaint L'Ouverture, Nick Nesbitt (Editor), Jean-Bertrand Aristide

By Ruth Anne Olson; CreoleTrans.; Beth Harvey Designs.; St. James Episcopal Church (Minneapolis, Minn.)

By Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Amy Wilentz

By Kathie Klarreich

By Tracy Kidder

By Amy Wilentz

By Michel-Rolph Trouillot

By Rocky Cotard and Laurent Dubois

FREE ONLINE

By Zora Neale Hurston

By Doris L. Garraway

By Randall Robinson

By Paul Farmer, M.D., Jonathan Kozol (Foreword by), Noam Chomsky (Introduction by)

By Alfred Metraux, Hugo Charteris (Translator)

By Beverly Bell

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