Description
Book SynopsisWomen's migration within Mexico and from Mexico to the United States is increasing; nearly as many women as men are migrating. This title analyzes how economically and politically displaced migrant women assert agency in everyday life.
Trade Review“A deeply felt and thoroughly researched work,
Women and Migration in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands brings together some of the most important feminist voices in the field of immigration and transnational studies. I think Gloria Anzaldúa would have been proud to see how the authors of this book took her concept of the borderlands and grounded it ethnographically in the sorrows, struggles, and dreams of contemporary Chicana and Mexican women. A timely and courageous book that speaks to the major issue of our time—the search for home across and between and despite borders.”—Ruth Behar, author of
Translated Woman: Crossing the Border with Esperanza’s Story“Denise A. Segura and Patricia Zavella have compiled a spectacular collection on gender, migration, sexuality, work, and family. Timely, provocative, and imaginative, the essays in
Women and Migration in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands will become essential readings across a variety of (inter)disciplines: Latina/o studies, cultural studies, sociology, anthropology, gender studies, Latin American studies, American studies, urban planning, and public policy.”—Vicki Ruiz, author of
From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth-Century America“[A] worthy and much-needed contribution to debates about women, gender, and migration in the borderlands, which, as the editors point out, remains understudied, displaced, or at times simply ignored. Also notable is the interdisciplinary nature of the compilation, which brings a number of significant contributions into a shared space and thus sets a precedent for further interdisciplinary dialogue. . . . The interdisciplinary mix makes the book attractive to a variety of academic fields such as political science and international relations, Chicana/o studies, Latin American and Latino studies, border studies, sociology, and human geography . . . . It is certainly a valuable contribution to studies of women and/or the U.S.-Mexican borderlands in each of these disciplines.” -- Marie Woodling * Hispanic American Historical Review *
“This collection is important not only because it sites gender front and center but also because it adds flesh and bone to the borderlands concept by bringing a series of issues into discussion: cultural representations; identity construction and reconstruction; structural, personal, and symbolic violence; sexuality; popular culture; transnational social networks; and marriage and motherhood.” -- Lynn Stephen * Latin American Research Review *
Table of ContentsAbout the Series ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
Part 1. Borderlands as Site of Struggle
Toward a Planetary Civil Society / Rosa Linda Fregoso 35
A Glass Half Empty: Latina Reproduction and Public Discourse / Leo R. Chavez 67
Illegal Status and Social Citizenship: Thoughts on Mexican Immigrants in a Postnational World / Adelaida R. Del Castillo 92
“Looking Like a Lesbian”: The Organization of Sexual Monitoring at the United States-Mexican Border / Eithne Luibheid 106
The Value of Immigrant Life / Jonathan Xavier India 134
Part 2. The Topography of Violence
Manufacturing Sexual Subjects: “Harassment,” Desire, and Discipline on a Maquiladora Shopfloor / Leslie Salzinger 161
The Dialectics of Still Life: Murder, Women, and Maquiladoras / Melissa W. Wright 184
Rape as a Weapon of War: Militarized Rape at the US-Mexico Border / Sylvanna M. Falcon 203
“Nunca he dejada de tener terror”: Sexual Violence in the Lives of Mexican Immigrant Women / Gloria Gonzalez-Lopez 224
Part 3. Flexible Accumulation and Resistance
Changing Constructions of Sexuality and Risk: Migrant Mexican Women Farmworkers in California / Xochitl Castaneda and Patricia Zavella 249
Space, Gender, and Work: Home-Based Workers in Mexico / Faranak Miraftab 269
Mexican Immigrant Women and the New Domestic Labor / Maria de la Luz Ibarra 286
“Aqui estamos y no nos vamos” Justice for Janitors in Los Angeles and New Citizenship Claims / Cynthia Cranford 306
Part 4. Family Formations and Transnational Social Networks
Transborder Families and Gendered Trajectories of Migration and Work / Norma Ojeda de la Pena 327
Women, Migration, and Household Survival Strategies: Mixtec Women in Tijuana / Laura Velasco Ortiz 341
Single-Parent Families: Choice or Constraint? The Formation of Female-Headed Households in Mexican Shanty Towns / Sylvia Chant 360
Working at Motherhood: Chicana and Mexican Immigrant Mothers and Employment / Denise A. Segura 368
“I’m Here, but I’m There”: The Meanings of Latina Transnational Motherhood / Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo and Ernestine Avila 388
Part 5. Transculturation and Identity in Daily Life
Reproduction of Gender Relations in the Mexican Migrant Community of New Rochelle, New York / Victoria Malkan 415
“En el norte la mujer manda”: Gender, Generation, and Geography in a Mexican Transnational Community / Jennifer S. Hirsch 438
Unruly Passions: Poetics, Performance, and Gender in the Ranchera Song / Olga Najera-Ramirez 456
Becoming Selena, Becoming Latina / Deborah Paredez 477
Cyberbrides and Global Imaginaries: Mexican Women’s Turn from the National to the Foreign / Felicity Schaeffer-Grabiel 503
Bibliography 521
Contributors 585
Index 587
