Mobiles, Migrants and Money on the Border of Haiti and the Dominican Republic

Heather A. HorstDigital Ethnography Research Centre

RMIT University, Australia

Erin B TaylorInstituto de Ciências Sociais

Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal

IMTFI Annual ConferenceUniversity of California, Irvine

5 December 2012

Mobiles, Migrants and Money on the Border of Haiti and the Dominican Republic

Video

The Family and the Household

mobility mapsfamily

work

Bronte lives in

Pedernales, Haitian and Dominican

citizen

Alain lives in

Pedernales, only has Haitian

identification

“You are obliged to call people, and if you have to call Haiti and you have trouble talking, then you spend a lot of money. You look at your clock and it’s already dinner time, you’re going to end up not having any dinner. …The positive thing about cell phones is to be able to greet your people, to know about your most important friends. For example, you are my friend, I need to talk to you, let me call my friend to see that how you are. ‘Hi Fulano, where are you? I’m in Pedernales, sitting here and drinking a juice. I’m resting, I’m dining, I’m bathing, I’ll call you later, I send you greeting.’ I call my mother, my old woman, and I ask her how her day is going. Because these people are so far away that you can’t see with your own eyes whether they are okay or not.”

Alain, PK Study

'Plastic' Objects

States and Mobility

Work and Livelihood

Mobile money at Fonkoze

Cross-Border Arbitrage

Anse-a-Pitres, Haiti Pedernales, Dominican Republic

Where to from here?