Panel looks at Haitian labor conditions, human trafficking in Florida

March 28, 2011

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — As part of 2011 National Farm Worker Awareness week, the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program at the University of Florida is sponsoring a panel discussion March 30 titled “Haitian Labor Enslaved: From Haiti to Florida!”

The free program will be held at 7 p.m. at the Alachua County Library Headquarters, 401 E. University Ave.

This event is open to the public. Extra credit sign-up sheets will be available for students.

This panel will illuminate the connections between the exploitation that face migrant farm workers in Haiti and Florida and especially Alachua County. The panel will engage the audience in ways to end these abuses.

Panel speakers include UF law professor Kenneth Nunn, UF professor emeritus of anthropology Gerald Murray and Sherry Kitchens, president of the Child Advocacy Center in Gainesville. The panel will be moderated by Anita Spring, professor emeritus in anthropology at UF.

Murray has done anthropological fieldwork in Haiti and the Dominican Republic since the 1970s, paying frequent attention to agrarian labor recruitment patterns on both sides of the border. He has also carried out research on the trafficking of Haitian children. Kitchens participates in the Statewide Task Force on Human Trafficking, and was involved as a social service coordinator with the recent Haitian trafficking case in Alachua County. Nunn is a member of the American Bar Association, and he will discuss human trafficking in Florida.

National Farmworker Awareness week raises awareness about farm worker issues and to honor their contributions to our society. There are an estimated 2-3 million men, women, and children work in the fields in the United States. Yet they remain largely invisible and are often subjected to exploitation and abuse.

For more information, contact the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program at 352-392-7168. Visit our website at http://www.history.ufl.edu/oral/.

Co-sponsors are: Student Action with Farmworkers, Duke University, CHISPAS, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Harvest of Hope Foundation, Interfaith Alliance for Immigrant Justice, National Farm Worker Ministry, Fl., Mexico Solidarity Network, Rural Women’s Health Project, UF Student Farm Worker Alliance, UF Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, and the United Nations Association-USA, Gainesville Chapter.