In Memoriam, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, 1949-2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot–brilliant anthropologist, historian, inspiring thinker–passed away 5 July 2012. Devastating loss for anthropology, history, Haiti, all of us.This page links to tributes, memorials, and news (refresh browser for updates). A separate page is dedicated to Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s bibliography.
À la mémoire de Michel Rolph Trouillot
Le bureau du Secrétaire d’État à l’alphabétisation a salué avec émotion et respect la mémoire du professeur et anthropologue haïtien, Michel Rolph Trouillot . . . Monsieur Trouillot était considéré comme une grande figure du monde intellectuel en Haïti. Il est l’auteur de plusieurs ouvrages et articles qui ont fait grand écho. Parmi ses œuvres, on retient surtout« ti dife boule sou listwa Dayiti », un best-seller, selon des critiques.
Le Matin, 12 July 2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot, scholar of Caribbean history, 1949-2012, William HarmsMichel-Rolph Trouillot, a professor of anthropology at UChicago and a leading authority on the dynamics of power across cultural boundaries, died July 5. He was 62. . . .
Yarimar Bonilla, PhD’08, a former student of Trouillot and an assistant professor of anthropology at Rutgers University, said, “It’s hard to know how to mark the passing of someone who has so thoroughly transformed your life through both word and deed.
“Rolph’s work is the gold-standard for me intellectually, but he was also a deep personal inspiration: bold, charismatic, unabashed, unapologetic, and fully engaged with life’s pleasures and ironies. He offered a model of an academic who never compromised on life, love or laughter. I don’t think this was coincidental to the power of his work. His writing does not just inform — it inspires and transforms. He always encouraged his students to find their ‘burning questions’ to follow their passions as this was what would truly sustain them and feed not just their careers but their souls.”
UChicagoNews, 10 July 2012
Anthro in the news 07/09/2012Anthropologyworks has a lead article from anthropologist Mark Schuller on Haiti, Too Soon for Carnival: Sweeping Haiti’s 400,000 Poor Back Under the Rug and links to news about Michel-Rolph Trouillot at the end.
anthropologyworks, 9 July 2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot, 1949-2012Thank you to Ryan Anderson for this piece on Savage Minds and to reader CarlosFM for the link.
Savage Minds, 8 July 2012
The Headline I Wish We Were Reading: Anthropology Changed Everything, Jason AntrosioThe headline I wish we were reading is how the nation gathered to reflect on Trouillot’s work and legacy: Anthropology Changed Everything.
Living Anthropologically, 8 July 2012
Le célèbre anthropologue et historien haïtien Michel-Rolph Trouillot est mort (also published at AlterPresse)Michel-Rolph Trouillot « s’est toujours penché avec intelligence, passion et sensibilité sur les questions sociales haïtiennes et laisse derrière lui une œuvre qui constitue une référence incontournable pour toute réflexion sur les réalités haïtiennes et sur les sciences sociales en général », lit-on dans le communiqué de la Fondation Anne-Marie Morisset.
Signal FM Haiti, 06 Juillet 2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot destacado antropólogo haitianoEl Dr. Michel-Rolph Trouillot destacado antropólogo haitiano y Profesor de la Universidad de Chicago falleció el pasado 5 de Julio de 2012. En el 2011 el Dr. Trouillot recibió el premio “Frantz Fanon Lifetime Achievement” el cual es otorgado anualmente por la Asociación de Filósofos del Caribe a destacados intelectuales por su contribución a los estudios y al pensamiento caribeños. . . .
Transformaciones Globales. La Antropología y el mundo moderno (2011) contiene “seis ensayos que hacen una lectura crítica de la antropología desde el análisis de su campo temático y sus principales objetos discursivos; los contenidos de los discursos universales creados en el Atlántico Norte y su despliegue en los países periféricos, sobre todo (pero no exclusivamente) en el Caribe; las características de la globalización neoliberal; el tratamiento antropológico del Estado en la modernidad y su adecuación en la era global; el papel de la cultura en la disciplina y la manera como los antropólogos han enfrentado su uso y movilización por actores no académicos; y los lugares creados por la intervención etnográfica, desde el trabajo de campo hasta las locaciones. Esta traducción tiene el propósito de estimular la lectura de uno de los pensadores más osados y originales de la antropología contemporánea”.
Ana Servigna, 8 Julio 2012
Dr. Michel-Rolph Trouillot & Haiti’s Gold RushThe island from which Dr. Michel Rolph Trouillot came is busy being reconstructed. Everyone is figuring out ways to harvest fruit from all the trees that have yet to be planted. While all the super-sizing of Haiti continues without a break, while investors rush to scrape the gold mines clean, let us heed Dr. Trouillot’s words and remember not to silence the past. Let us use the ropes of the past to ring the bell of Haiti’s real future. . . . Rest in perfect peace, Dr. Trouillot. VoicesfromHaiti celebrates your immeasurable contributions to Haiti and the world. We send our sincere condolences to those who have only begun to feel the sting of your passing.
Voices from Haiti, 7 July 2012
Passing of Esteemed Anthropologist Michel-Rolph TrouillotCHICAGO, IL, USA (defend.ht) – The esteemed anthropologist, Michel-Rolph Trouillot is being mourned by the social science community after passing among family members in Chicago, Illinois, Thursday. Trouillot’s colleagues all over the world regard him as a brilliant anthropologist, a historian, and an inspiring thinker. For Haiti it is a loss for the historic intellectual community and the entire nation. . . . He was a recipient of the Frantz Fanon Lifetime Achievement Prize in 2011. This award is given annually by the Caribbean Philosophical Association in recognition of up to three works in or of special interest to Caribbean thought.
Defend Haiti, 7 July 2012
Vibrant hommage de l’Université d’Etat à l’intellectuel Michel-Rolph Trouillot, décédé aux Etats-UnisLe rectorat de l’Université d’Etat d’Haïti a exprimé vendredi sa consternation devant la disparition de l’anthropologue et historien de renommée internationale, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, dont il a salué l’énorme contribution au renouvellement des sciences sociales en Haïti. . . . Enfin, soulignant que certains ont « trouvé en lui de nouvelles raisons de croire en la perfectibilité de l’humain et en la régénération d’Haïti », le rectorat a présenté ses sympathies à la famille du disparu, particulièrement à son frère Lyonel Trouillot, l’un des principaux écrivains haïtiens d’aujourd’hui. L’historien Pierre Buteau a également rendu un vibrant hommage à Michel-Rolph Trouillot pour son œuvre considérable et son effort de renouvellement du discours haïtien dans le domaine des sciences sociales et de l’histoire des idées.
Radio Kiskeya, 6 juillet 2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot: Power and the Production of History, Zinn Education ProjectHaitian scholar, professor, and writer Michel-Rolph Trouillot passed away in the early hours of July 5, 2012 at his residence in Chicago. . . . In his memory, we share an excerpt from the preface to Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History
: “I grew up in a family where history sat at the dinner table. All his life my father engaged in a number of parallel professional activities, none of which defined him, but most of which were steeped in his love of history.”
Teaching A People’s History, 6 July 2012
Michel-Rolph Trouillot, 26 novembre 1949 – 5 juillet 2012Pour marquer le départ d’un grand homme, d’un penseur qui a marqué notre temps et notre monde; pour exprimer notre peine, pour témoigner de l’impact d’une vie sur la notre, nous vous invitons à partager avec nous et avec le monde, des témoignages, des photos, des citations dans la langue de votre choix. Vous pouvez utiliser l’espace des commentaires ou nous envoyer des mails à nadeve.regine@gmail.com pour que nous les ajoutions.
Tande, jeudi 5 juillet 2012
In memoriam: Michel-Rolph Trouillot, John R. RobyTrouillot was known as a scholar of the history of Caribbean people, particularly their emergence from enslavement and the trials they have been subjected to in the process of integration into the increasingly global economy, and of the relationship between power and history. . . . I vividly remember my PhD adviser handing me a copy of his Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History
, and how I read it in a clip. The words seemed to burn off the page. It remains, to me, the single most influential book I have read about the way history is produced. . . . Trouillot’s concern in that book is to understand why some narratives of history become more accepted, more canonical, than others. Every account enters the historical record with some of its constituent parts missing: “Silences,” as he calls them, are not oversights of historical archives, but are constitutive of them, due to unequal power among the assemblers and subjects of those archives. When “facts” of history are created, so are silences–the things that are left out, disregarded, minimized. When you consider a historical account, you must recognize it is not an objective assemblage of things that happened, but an account that is shot though with power, and one that has many, many stories behind the story.
Digs & Docs, 6 July 2012
Trouillot’s consideration of how the Haitian revolution was silenced in its present moment (and beyond of course, “ghosts that are best left undisturbed”) by Western recorders compels me to reflect on our own present moment. It is apparent that if you surrender to the historical unconsciousness that dominates our present society’s sense of itself (i.e. “American Exceptionalism”) you are absolved from resisting the present; empty, homogenous time renders resistance futile. In the consciousness of the ‘mainstream’, Occupy Wall Street is a ‘lost cause.’ Nonetheless, other narratives are written and published on blogs, on Twitter, and by independent presses, including this narrative here. The rebellion continues because there is no mystical power that consolidates and erases with totality, and certainly no cabal or conspiracy (though, undoubtedly, an oligarchy), but there is human agency and hope. Trouillot’s book is a powerful indictment of history, but one must not forget the potentially subversive power of history as well. In his narration of the San Domingo Revolution, The Black Jacobins
, C.L.R. James did not just write an exquisite history (despite its silences) of Toussaint L’Overture’s struggle, of the Caribbean, of modernity and transnationalism, but also a call for global revolution.
Past & Future Present(s), 6 July 2012
From the Haiti Press Network, Décès de l’éminent intellectuel et universitaire: Michel-Rolph Trouillot:L’intellectuel, universitaire et parolier haïtien Michel-Rolph Trouillot est décédé dans la nuit du 4 au 5 juillet dans sa résidence à Chicago, a appris HPN de sa sœur, l’écrivaine et poète Evelyne Trouillot. Ce brillant intellectuel et universitaire «s’est toujours penché avec intelligence, passion et sensibilité sur les questions sociales haïtiennes et qui laisse derrière lui une œuvre qui constitue une référence incontournable pour toute réflexion sur les réalités haïtiennes et sur les sciences sociales en général», peut-on lire dans une note de la famille.Esteemed Haitian Anthropologist Michel-Rolph Trouillot (1949-2012) has passed away, Lisa Paravisini-Gebert
Haitian intellectual, professor and writer Michel-Rolph Trouillot passed away in the early hours of July 5th at his residence in Chicago, Haiti Press Network has learned from his sister, writer and poet Evelyne Trouillot. Here is a translation of their report. This brilliant intellectual and academic, HPN reports from a family communication, “always looked with intelligence, passion and sensitivity on Haiti’s social issues and leaves behind a body of work that is an indispensable reference for any discussion of Haitian realities and the social sciences in general.”
Repeating Islands, 6 July 2012
