Bookcase Favorites: Taking Haiti
Mary Renda’s Taking Haiti: Military Occupation and the Culture of U.S. Imperialism, 1915-1940 challenges readers to reflect on American empire and the complex relationship between its center and peripheries. Using a rich array of primary sources and interdisciplinary methods, Renda examines the interplay between domestic culture and imperial expansion through the lens of the early twentieth century American occupation of Haiti. Placing domestic cultural attitudes at the center of U.S. foreign relations, Renda sheds light on how national consciousness during the interwar period both influenced and was shaped by the occupation, and how identity historically has been used as a tool of empire.
Divided into two parts, Taking Haiti examines the 1915-1934 U.S. occupation of Haiti through the experiences of Marines and the American public. Analyzing the occupation from a cultural lens, Renda illuminates how paternalist narratives legitimized the invasion and transformed Americans’ self-image. By depicting Haiti as a child-like nation in need of parental authority, U.S. policymakers and Marines sanctioned violence and portrayed intervention and domination as acts of altruism. Inextricably connected to this narrative, Renda demonstrates, were notions of racial hierarchy.
Drawing from a diverse variety of primary sources, including diaries, letters, memoirs, media, and literature from the period, Renda illustrates how popular representations of the occupation contributed to what she describes as a domestic culture of imperialism. From pulp fiction and plays to literature and journalism, Americans depicted Haitians as primitive, superstitious, and promiscuous, among other racist and sensationalized representations. Such paternalist and civilizational discourse bolstered perceptions of American greatness and informed “the myriad doubts, questions, and possibilities raised by contact with another culture and another nation.”
Prospective readers should note that Renda’s work is not a story about Haitians or the occupation of Haiti itself. Rather, it seeks to contextualize the occupation as part of the cultural history of the United States and illuminate the domestic social dimensions of American imperialism. In highlighting how social constructions contributed to the invasion of Haiti and shaped subsequent understandings of Americanness, the book sheds light on the symbiotic relationship between culture and policy – indeed, paternalism and racism were just as much instruments of empire as military force was.
Taking Haiti illuminates the value of incorporating cultural analysis into the study of U.S. diplomatic history. Renda’s approach brings a sensitivity and cultural awareness to foreign policy discourse that is all too often lacking, often to a policy detriment. Like any interpretive lens, Renda’s is not all-encompassing, but it brings forth thoughtful perspectives in an area where cultural insensitivity and ignorance often obscure important truths. This book thus remains an especially noteworthy contribution to the historiography of U.S. foreign relations.
As the United States maintains unprecedented influence globally, Renda prompts important reflection on our own contemporary discourse on the U.S. and the world. In an era of American hegemony, the ways in which American policymakers and prominent narratives frame and inform U.S. foreign policy especially warrant consideration. Renda offers readers a mirror from which to critically examine how contemporary cultural institutions imbue our national identity, our relationship to policy decisions, and our international consciousness.
