Educational Media Reviews Online

The latest work from filmmaker Michèle Stephenson, Stateless juxtaposes the past and present of the history of Haitians in the Dominican Republic (D.R.). To do this, Stephenson weaves together the historic violence against Haitians in the Dominican Republic with the current approach of systemic disenfranchisement and denationalization. Viewers learn of the horrific violence and genocide that Haitians experienced in 1937 under Dictator Rafael Trujillo’s rule. Viewers also learn about the campaign of former Dominican presidents Leonel Fernández and Danilo Medina to revoke the citizenship of Dominicans of Haitian descent through bureaucratic means by invalidating birthright citizenship from 1929 forward.

The film follows two women who represent the perspectives of those on the front lines of the issue of citizenship and residency for Dominicans with Haitian ancestry: Rosa Iris Diendomi Álvarez, an attorney and political candidate and Gladys Feliz, a Dominican nationalist activist. Rosa works with undocumented Dominicans to try to help assert why their citizenship should be reinstated, providing the documentation required, returning to local offices to repeatedly talk to officials about so-called “errors” found within the paperwork. The film closely follows the case of her cousin Juan Teofilo who was stripped of his Dominican citizenship when he tried to renew a passport. The inconsistencies and frustrations of his case illustrate the expense, energy, and persistence required to confront a deliberately labyrinthine bureaucracy. Forced to leave his children with their grandmother in the D.R. he is exiled in Haiti with distant relatives while he seeks to reinstate his citizenship with Rosa’s help. Juan’s case illustrates the damage caused by Medina’s policies - financial, emotional, and societal. Inspired by this work and seeking to make a more sustained impact, she runs for a seat in Congress. The campaign process illustrates for viewers and Rosa, why some changes are so long in coming - many voters are paid by candidates on election day. Meanwhile, viewers watch Gladys ascribe all sorts of social ills to the presence of Haitians in the Dominican Republic. However, she seems blind to the fact that when she speaks with people at the Haitian-D.R. border, they answer her questions in fluent Spanish. When one man is asked, he answers that he is Dominican.

In what seems like an international fascist parallel, former Dominican President Danilo Medina was in power 2012-2020, utilizing rhetoric of the Dominican Nationalist Movement mirrors that of the 2016-2020 Trump administration: build a wall and keep migrants out because migrants contribute to high crime rates. The film effectively portrays the casual racism of government bureaucracy that convinces citizens to accept and comply with sustaining and supporting ethnocentric policies, showing Dominicans’ complicity in participating in the active discrimination against their fellow citizens of Haitian descent.

Stephenson creates a stark picture of what it is like to be homeless, without a nation to claim, without paperwork and documentation to prove belonging and membership in society. There is a clear us/them framework that emerges, one that seems to echo from every current immigration crisis occurring all over the world. The film effectively questions why borders exist and probes at why citizens enforce them.

Awards:
Best Feature Documentary, BlackStar Film Festival; Special Jury Prize – Canadian Feature, Hot Docs Documentary Film Festival; Best Feature Film Audience Award, Boston Latino International Festival

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