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Bêtes Noires

By Lauren Derby

Bêtes Noires

By Lauren Derby

0 - Default Title
Description
In Bêtes Noires, Lauren Derby explores storytelling traditions among the people of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, focusing on shape-shifting spirit demons called baka/bacá. Drawing on interviews with and life stories of residents in a central Haitian-Dominican frontier town, Derby contends that bacás-hot spirits from the sorcery side of vodou/vodú that present as animals and generate wealth for their owners-are a manifestation of what Dominicans call fukú de Colón, the curse of Columbus. The dogs, pigs, cattle, and horses that Columbus brought with him are the only types of animals that bacás become. As instruments of Indigenous dispossession, these animals and their spirit demons convey a history of trauma and racialization in Dominican popular culture. In the context of slavery and beyond, bacás keep alive the promise of freedom, since shape-shifting has long enabled fugitivity. As Derby demonstrates, bacás represent a complex history of race, religion, repression, and resistance.
Product details
Binding:
Paperback
Number of Pages:
358
Release Date:
2025-11-18
Publication Date:
2025-11-18
Publisher:
Duke University Press
Languages:
Original: English
ISBN10:
1478032782
ISBN13:
9781478032786
GPSR Manufacturer Reference:
[email protected]
Weight:
581 g
Height:
152 cm
Width:
229 cm
Thickness:
21 cm
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