Gods, gender and sexuality: representations of Vodou and Santería in Haitian and Cuban cultural production

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Humphrey, Paul Richard (2013). Gods, gender and sexuality: representations of Vodou and Santería in Haitian and Cuban cultural production. University of Birmingham. Ph.D.

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Abstract

This thesis analyses the manner in which gender and sexuality are explored within the context of Vodou and Santería in a number of Haitian and Cuban novels and plays. Focusing on the body as the nodal point between the physical and spiritual planes, it examines women’s negotiation of religious, social and political life in Haiti and Cuba as participants in these marginalised religious communities. The narratives these works of fiction comprise indicate the complex nature of such experiences and recognise the active participation of women in Caribbean society, challenging the way in which they have often been limited in, or omitted from, official discourse. By drawing on African-derived religious traditions in the Caribbean, these texts are inscribed within a worldview in which the physical and the spiritual, the living and the dead coexist, and one that allows divisions within and between concepts such as gender, sexuality, womanhood, space and nation to be transcended. In so doing, these authors write alternative and arguably more complete accounts of lived experience in Haiti and Cuba that serve as a source of knowledge regarding the complexities of daily life and provide a means through which the voice of the marginalised can be heard.

Type of Work:

Thesis (Doctorates > Ph.D.)

Award Type:

Doctorates > Ph.D.

Supervisor(s):