Little Haiti

This article relates to Everything Inside

Several stories in Edwidge Danticat's Everything Inside take place in Florida's Little Haiti neighborhood, a popular residence for Haitian immigrants and exiles (along with individuals from other Caribbean nations) located in Miami Dade County. The neighborhood has a population of 28,000 people, with 73 percent identifying as Black and 20 percent as Hispanic. Forty-one percent of the neighborhood's residents were born outside the United States. As a whole, Miami Dade County is home to the largest population of Haitians in the nation.

Originally called Lemon City, Little Haiti was settled shortly after the Civil War by homesteaders. Haitians began arriving to the area in droves in the 1960s and 70s, fleeing the brutal dictatorship of François "Papa Doc" Duvalier. A Haitian pro-democracy activist named Viter Juste who left Haiti in the 1960s and later settled in Florida wrote a letter to the Miami Herald in 1977 in which he referred to his new home as "Little Port-au-Prince." The Herald ran with the concept but shortened the name to "Little Haiti."

Since then, the neighborhood has become a beacon of national pride and cultural celebration. The Little Haiti Cultural Center offers educational opportunities, art exhibits, music and dance performances and more to give visitors a taste of Haitian life. The area is home to many small art galleries as well, and it also has a vibrant street art tradition, featuring numerous murals, including a large portrait of President Obama located at 54th Street and Miami Avenue, done by local Haitian artist Serge Toussaint. Caribbean food is celebrated in the neighborhood's diverse restaurants, including Chez Le Bebe and Chef Creole, both favorites of the late Anthony Bordain. The bookstore Libreri Mapou is another popular destination, opened in the 1990s. In addition to selling books, the store serves as a community meeting place and library, and founder Jon Mapou teaches French and Creole classes there on the weekends.

Gentrification is a growing concern in Little Haiti. As the neighborhood's status as an artistic mecca rises, so do property values, making it more difficult for working-class residents to afford to live there. Furthermore, Little Haiti boasts a higher elevation than much of the surrounding area, and with rising sea levels, scientists have predicted that large swathes of Miami could become uninhabitable in the coming years. Thus property developers with deep pockets have set their sights on Little Haiti, making it even more of a challenge for residents to find affordable property. Community organizer Marleine Bastien spoke to CNN about this issue after she found herself unable to secure a reasonably priced location for a planned community center and day school and learned that a company called Magic City Development had recently spent $1 billion for property in the neighborhood. They plan to build high-rise apartments and retail stores on the site. "This is a plan to actually erase Little Haiti," Bastien stated, "Because this is the one place where immigration and climate gentrification collide."

Picture of Caribbean Marketplace in Little Haiti, courtesy of Averette.

Filed under Places, Cultures & Identities

This "beyond the book article" relates to Everything Inside. It originally ran in September 2019 and has been updated for the July 2020 paperback edition. Go to magazine.

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