Bastien, Marliene

Pessoa singular

Bastien, Marliene

1959-

Marleine Bastien (b. 1959) is a licensed clinical social worker, human rights activist, and published author based in Miami, FL. For over thirty years Bastien has advocated for Haitian, immigrant, and women’s rights in South Florida. She has led many important advocacy campaigns such as The Haitian Immigration Refugee Fairness Act of 1998; Temporary Protected Status; The Dream Act; Comprehensive Immigration Reform; Living Wage and Human Rights Ordinance; and the Children’s Trust. Additionally, has been centrally involved in the formation of many community organizations, namely Fanm Ayisyen Nan Miyami (FANM) (Haitian Women of Miami), now known as Family Action Network Movement; the Justice Coalition for the Haitian Children of Guantanamo; the Haitian-American Grassroots Coalition; the Haitian Neighborhood Center (Sant La); the Center for Haitian Studies; the Florida Immigrant Coalition, and more. For all her years of dedication, Bastien has been the recipient of many honors and awards.

Bastien was born in the small village of Pont-Benoit in Haiti to parents Philippe Bastien and Angelina Destinoble – she was the third of eight children. Her parents were rice and mango farmers and her father was also the village’s sole health practitioner; he treated the local residents’ health problems routinely. Bastien attended the esteemed Swiss school, College Bird in Port-Au-Prince and learned English while still in Haiti. Her activist impulses were ignited at a very young age through her father’s advocacy in the community – which frequently made him a target of the authorities – and she undertook voluntary positions while still a child and into her teen years. In addition, after learning English Bastien read Martin Luther King’s speeches and this gave her a sense of U.S.-based Black activism. Philippe Bastien ended up settling in Belle Glades, Florida because of the tensions in Haiti’s political climate during the 1980s. In 1981, at age twenty-two, Marleine also left Haiti to pursue higher education.

Shortly her arrival in Miami, Bastien visited the Krome Detention Center and her experience there irrevocably changed the course her life would take. She reflects, “Haitian refugees were placed in a big compound: men, women, and children and deported for the most part, in complete denial of their basic rights of due process. I started volunteering at the Haitian Refugee Center two days after arriving. I was hired as a paralegal a few months later. My goal was to go to Chicago, but once I joined the struggle for freedom and equal treatment for Haitian refugees, I could not leave” (Miami Girls Foundation). After training as a paralegal, Bastien completed her undergraduate and master’s degree in clinal/medical social work at Florida International University in 1987. During this time she joined Jan Mapou’s dance company, Sosyete Koukouy, and met the actor and poet, Jean Desire, who she married in 1998. The couple have three sons.

Once graduated from FIU, Bastien began working at Jackson Memorial Hospital and set up the first HIV/AIDS support group for women and families. In a recent interview for HistoryMiami’s “Queer Miami Stories,” she discussed the impact of HIV/AIDS on Haitians not only the impact of the disease itself, but more so about the harassment Haitian people received when the Haitian population was singled out along with LGBTQ-identifying people and intravenous drug users as the only people who could contract and spread the disease.* Bastien advocated for women and babies affected by HIV/AIDS at a time when men were the sole focus; she was the primary source of support for women and children dealing with the fallout of the virus. Her dedication to advocating particularly for Haitian women was prompted by the injustices she witnessed during the Duvalier dictatorship; she states, “I had a keen sense of the abuses, persecution, and lack of protection for the population, especially women and children who were the most vulnerable under the Duvalier dictatorship. I can still see in my mind’s eyes how women were beaten by Tonton Macoutes with a big “baton” (club) for not being able to pay expensive taxes” (Miami Girls Foundation).

In 2000, Bastien left Jackson memorial to manage FANM, which she established in 1991, full-time. Now a large and hugely important organization to South Florida, FANM advises people on matters including, but not limited to, immigration, housing, health access, education reform, gender equality, and human rights. While originally founded for the Haitian community specifically, FANM also provides resources and services to other minority and immigrant populations. Bastien has been widely acknowledged for her tireless years of advocacy, garnering awards such as Miami Dade County’s Volunteer of the Year Award in 1994, Miami Dade County’s Social Worker of the Year Award (2000), and multiple recognitions from the city.

Laura Bass
UGrow Fellow for the Department of Manuscripts and Archives Management, 2019-2020

Works Cited
Miami Girls Foundation. “Marleine Bastien.” https://miamigirls.org/miamigirls/marleine-bastien/.
*See video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka-zr-c7rLA

Final

Máximo

Laura Bass, 2020