About the Book
The Border Reader brings together canonical and cutting-edge humanities and social science scholarship on the US-Mexico border region. Spotlighting the vibrancy of border studies from the field's emergence to its enduring significance, the essays mobilize feminist, queer, and critical ethnic studies perspectives to theorize the border as a site of epistemic rupture and knowledge production. The chapters speak to how borders exist as regions where people and nation-states negotiate power, citizenship, and questions of empire. Among other topics, essays examine the lived experiences of the diverse undocumented people who move through and live in the border region and trace the gendered and sexualized experiences of the border, show how the US-Mexico border has become a site of illegality where immigrant bodies become racialized and excluded, and imagine anti- and post-border futures. Foregrounding the interplay of scholarly inquiry and political urgency stemming from the borderlands, The Border Reader presents a unique cross-section of critical interventions on the region.
Contributors. Leisy J. Abrego, Gloria E. Anzaldua, Martha Balaguera, Lionel Cantu, Leo R. Chavez, Raul Fernandez, Rosa-Linda Fregoso, Roberto G. Gonzales, Gilbert G. Gonzalez, Ramon Gutierrez, Kelly Lytle Hernandez, Jose E. Limon, Mireya Loza, Alejandro Lugo, Eithne Luibheid, Martha Menchaca, Cecilia Menjivar, Natalia Molina, Fiamma Montezemolo, Americo Paredes, Nestor Rodriguez, Renato Rosaldo, Gilberto Rosas, Maria Josefina Saldana-Portillo, Sonia Saldivar-Hull, Alicia Schmidt Camacho, Sayak Valencia Triana, Carlos G. Velez-Ibanez, Patricia Zavella
Table of Contents:
Introduction: On Theories from the Ends / Gilberto Rosas and Mireya Loza 3
Part I: Locating the Border
1. Empire and the Origins of Twentieth-Century Migration from Mexico to the United States / Gilbert G. GonzÁlez and RaÚl FernÁndez 13
2. Legal Violence: Immigration Law and the Lives of Central American Immigrants / Cecilia MenjÍvar and Leisy J. Abrego 45
3. Necro-Subjection: On Borders, Asylum, and Making Dead to Let Live / Gilberto Rosas 87
4. Reimagining Culture and Power against Late Industrial Capitalism and Other Forms of Conquest through Border Theory and Analysis / Alejandro Lugo 108
5. Tijuana Cuir / Sayak Valencia Triana 136
Part II: Documenting Identities
6. The United States, Mexico and Machismo / AmÉrico Paredes 149
7. The Spanish Settlement of Texas and Arizona / Martha Menchaca 168
8. A Place Called Home: A Queer Political Economy of Mexican Immigrant Men’s Family Experiences / Lionel CantÚ 199
9. Migrations / Patricia Zavella 222
Part III: En/Gendering Borders
10. Changing Chicano Narratives / Renato Rosaldo 265
11. Feminism on the Border: From Gender Politics to Geopolitics / Sonia SaldÍvar-Hull 282
12. Trans-migrations: Agency and Confinement at the Limits of Sovereignty / Martha Balaguera 301
13. Carne, Carnales, and the Carnivalesque / JosÉ E. LimÓn 324
Part IV: Othering Spaces, Othering Bodies
14. The Erotic Zone: Sexual Transgression on the U.S.-Mexican Border / RamÓn GutiÉrrez 345
15. Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Race, and Disability in the Early-Twentieth-Century United States / Natalia Molina 355
16. “Looking Like a Lesbian”: The Organization of Sexual Monitoring at the U.S.–Mexican Border / Eithne LuibhÉid 372
17. Migrant Melancholia: Emergent Discourses of Mexican Migrant Traffic in Transnational Space / Alicia Schmidt Camacho 402
Part V: Border Crossings
18. “Awakening to a Nightmare”: Abjectivity and Illegality in the Lives of Undocumented 1.5-Generation Latino Immigrants to the United States / Roberto G. Gonzales and Leo R. Chavez 431
19. Regions of Refuge in the United States: Issues, Problems, and Concerns for the Future of Mexican-Origin Populations in the United States / Carlos G. VÉlez-IbÁÑez 466
20. The Battle for the Border: Notes on Autonomous Migration, Transnational Communities, and the State / NÉstor RodrÍguez 500
21. Yo Era IndÍgena: Race, Modernity and the Transformational Politics of Transnational Labor / Mireya Loza 518
Part VI: New Border Imaginaries
22. Tijuana: Hybridity and Beyond: A Conversation with NÉstor GarcÍa Canclini / Fiamma Montezemolo 563
23. The Art of Witness / Rosa-Linda Fregoso 585
24. Amnesty or Abolition? Felons, Illegals, and the Case for a New Abolition Movement / Kelly Lytle HernÁndez 608
25. How to Tame a Wild Tongue / Gloria AnzaldÚa 628
26. “Wavering on the Horizon of Social Being”: The Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo and the Legacy of Its Radical Character in Ámerico Paredes’s George Washington GÓmez / MarÍa Josefina SaldaÑa-Portillo 639
Contributors 671
Credits 673
Index 677
About the Author :
Gilberto Rosas is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Latina/o Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and author of Barrio Libre: Criminalizing States and Delinquent Refusals of the New Frontier and Unsettling: The El Paso Massacre, Resurgent White Nationalism, and the US-Mexico Border.
Mireya Loza is Associate Professor of History at Georgetown University and author of Defiant Braceros: How Migrant Workers Fought for Racial, Sexual, and Political Freedom.
Review :
“International borders are abjection machines capable of dazzling violence. They elude easy understanding; their fungibility signals each state’s intrinsic dependence upon them. They require, therefore, a multipronged analysis that The Border Reader provides by bringing together foundational essays tackling the border as both a material force and an imaginary site. This kaleidoscopic approach reveals the density of the border and its lingering wake.” - Mary Pat Brady, author of (Scales of Captivity: Racial Capitalism and the Latinx Child) “The Border Reader is an outstanding collection of essays on the political complexities, identities and cultures, and futures of the US-Mexico border region. The editors have brilliantly organized the volume into key themes including borders and the politics of empire building, identity formation, gender relations, migrant crossings, and border imaginaries. With its emphasis on the work of Latinx scholars, The Border Reader is an important intervention in current debates about security, migration, and the future of borders.” - Miguel Díaz-Barriga, coauthor of (Fencing in Democracy: Border Walls, Necrocitizenship, and the Security State)
