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![[Jerry Gilles]](../images-09/jerry-gilles.jpg) Jerry Gilles, MD |
Dr. Jerry M. Gilles obtained a Bachelor of Science degree at Columbia University and a doctorate degree at SUNY at Stony
Brook. He did post-graduate training at Beth Israel and at Einstein in New York. He is Co-Director of the Maternal
Fetal Medicine Division at the University of Miami. He has published in leading medical journals.
Medical research is a fitting profession for him as his great-grandfather, Boutoulou, was a traditional healer who treated with herbs what Dr. Gilles now treats with pharmaceutical products often derived from those same herbs. Dr. Gilles considers himself a world citizen and views all humans and religions as having a common thread. By family oral history and tradition of Lwa Rasin, he traces his ancestry to the city of Ambriz in the Kongo, to the Nanchon Ewe of Dahomey, and to the Mede Nanchon of Sierra Leone. Boutoulou himself was called Mede. By genetic testing, he is also descendant of the Nanchon Foula of Ginen. These are the people who brought to Haiti their culture, their knowledge, and their beliefs. It is in honor of these ancestors’ contributions to the making of our world, that Sévis Ginen is so personal and so fascinating to him. His most recent publication is Remembrance: Roots, Rituals, and Reverence in Vodou also available in Creole as Sévis Ginen: Rasin, Rityél, Respé lan Vodou (Available January 2009) online at BookmanLit. |