UF expert available to talk about Haiti's children, dilemma of Haitian government, prospects for recovery

February 4, 2010

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — American-Haitian adoption practices are being misinterpreted in the news media, suggests a University of Florida researcher.

Gerald Murray, an anthropology professor, has done extensive research on Haiti’s restavek, a cultural tradition where parents who lack resources to support their children send them to work for a host family as a domestic servant. Traditionally, the children were sent to middle- and upper-class families to receive food, clothing and an education in exchange for labor. Now that poorer families have begun taking in children, Murray said it’s in Haiti’s urban areas where most of the children are exploited.

He said that parents who relocate one of their children believe that they are benefiting not only the child but their remaining children by having one less mouth to feed. Furthermore a relocated child who succeeds in life may possibly return to help parents in their old age.

Another area of misunderstanding is the American church group that was taking children to the Dominican Republic, Murray said, as most of the children were probably given to the group by parents or close relatives. Murray said that the term orphan is being used incorrectly with respect to such children.

The children were not all orphaned by the earthquake, he said. Rather most of the children were probably given up voluntarily as a part of Haitian child relocation customs. He said that he doubts that more than a small minority of the children on the adoption bus were genuine orphans.

“There has been a shift in recent decades. Now all parents in Haiti want their kids to get schooling. It’s this very desire — to have their child get better schooling — that leads them to place the child in a home that promises to send them to school,” Murray said.

Murray considers it incorrect to label the American church members as traffickers, kidnappers or smugglers. He said he is familiar with smuggling routes in the Dominican Republic, and the route used by the Americans was not a route for smuggling.

Murray has also written about the dilemma of the Haitian government and the organization of development activities in Haiti. Since the earthquake he has made several public presentations suggesting steps to deal with the devastation.

He can be reached at 352-374-4149 or by e-mail at murray@ufl.edu.