Elizabeth McAlister begins her examination of the Haitian processional phenomon, Rara, with a passage, penned in the first person, acknowledging her interest and awe at the moment of first witnessing Rara. From this dramatic narrative, she proceeds like a surgeon dissecting Rara politically, economically and linguistically. Lucky are we, those of us who are not yet experts on all things Haitian. McAlister has laid Rara out for us to understand. She is certainly one of the first-if not the first-to focus a scholar's attention on this music, this expression-in-motion.

McAlister's authority can be comprehended if one is aware of the extent of her Haitian immersion. Rara, the book, is a result of a five year study, from 1990 to 1995; the study itself was prefaced by the scholar's earlier trips to the island. McAlister is a mother to her Haitian children. She explains herself in the book's introduction as an "outsider/insider", of being both married to Haiti and being not of it. This unique relationship provides access to the culture and a distance from it to evaluate it. In Rara, McAlister disseminates. What is remarkable is that this transfer of information is so appealing and accessible. Rara is not a thesis, it's a book. Rara divides the cultural whole into intriguing chapters, such as: Vulgarity and the Small Man, Mystical Work, Rara as a Popular Army and Rara and "the Jew".

McAlister first shows her editorial smarts in her choice of subject, Rara being an Haitian story that needed to be told. Earlier observers were inclined to dismiss Rara as an excuse to mob, a dangerous gathering of peasants who group to blow horns, bang sticks and spout vulgarities. The first golden revelation that McAlister shares with her readers is that Rara must be seen as a series of dualities. Rara might be crude misogyny or it might be political commentary merely masquerading as absurd, sexual bravado. It can begin secular in appearance, jocular and even drunkenly, then develop during the course of a march, into a solemn, religious meditation. Rara alternates between work and play, politics and pleasure, a weaving of serious and frivolous themes.

This chameleon act is born from the necessity to survive. McAlister, to convey an informed definition of Rara, has found it necessary to sketch an entire history of Haiti. The reader learns that the island's history is a strangulating necklace of brutal regimes, one following the next. Outright democracy having been suppressed, democratic sentiment finds outlets through music, painting, Carnival and Rara. By refuting easy definition, by being an elixir of morale, a framework for the action of religious conviction, a possible forum for dissent, and the rebellious expression of Haitian identity and one's self as a sexual entity, Rara maintains it popularity. It has continued social value, all the while, playing like a fool, Rara is dodging the tag of "subversive" by the powers that be.

In Haiti, no contradictions seem to glare. It is, after all, a country which nominally accepts the oppressor's Catholicism while firmly committed to an amalgamation of West and Central African religious beliefs.

I bumped into Haiti in the middle of Prospect Park, smack in the center of Brooklyn. A group Haitians were parading with sheet metal horns and sections of bamboo, which I later learned are called vaskins. They struck on the sides of the bamboo with sticks while blowing through the ends. A hypnotic cacophony is what I heard. "Wow, what is this music?", I was desperate to know. McAlister's fabulous book is for people like me who itch to find out.

What I found lacking in McAlister's analysis is that most of her conclusions come from a reading of the lyrics which accompany the music. More attention to musical analysis would have been appreciated. Still, the field recordings collected on the included CD are arresting in their rawness. McAlister has provided an index to contextualize each track and that is exciting. Some attention-besides the wimpy mention, pages 52-55-on the sequined outfits that the Rara members sometimes wear, is an absolute necessity for this book's next edition, for besides a super description of the effigies which may be burnt on Easter week, McAlister provides no thoughts on the visual images of Vodou, on how these images relate to contemporary Haiti and to present tense Rara.

I mention these shallow short-comings of an otherwise amazing book only because these observations serve as a motivation to for me to either read more or better still, to go buy an airplane ticket to the island. When I do go to Haiti, I'll be carrying McAlister's book in my bag.

Book Review by James Harbison, April 2003


Rara: Vodou, Power, and Performance in Haiti and Its Diaspora by Elizabeth McAlister, book and accompanying CD, $24.95 retail, University of California Press, 2002.