Border and Becoming as Sites of Theory

2020 ◽  
pp. 194084472093904
Author(s):  
Michael C. McLane ◽  
Scott Jarvie
Keyword(s):  
Rio Grande Valley ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
The Past ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Qualitative Work ◽  
A Site

This paper travels backwards, imagining impossibly a particular time and place in the past, to consider how the Texas–Mexico border helps make sense of our own becomings as teachers, scholars, and persons. Drawing on St. Pierre’s notion of the past as a site of theory, we ruminate on the Rio Grande Valley as “the literal ground of our consciousness”. To do this qualitative work, we turn to others who have made sense of the border fictionally, as non-scholarly forms present different possibilities for research. We explore, nostalgically, the persons we might become in a Valley long past—an openness now restricted—and ways of (re)imagining becoming, of refusing narratives that foreclose hope—work crucially exigent for the precarious lives of those on the border today and the stories we tell about them.

The association between HIV/AIDS and food insecurity at the US–Mexico border: Experiences of low-income patients in the Rio Grande Valley

2020 ◽  
pp. 095646242093060
Author(s):  
Jennifer Tabler ◽  
Laryssa Mykyta ◽  
Jason M Nagata
Keyword(s):  
Food Insecurity ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Rio Grande Valley ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
Neighborhood Environment ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Aids Diagnosis ◽  
Living With Hiv ◽  
Us Mexico Border ◽  
Hiv Aids

US–Mexico border communities are uniquely vulnerable to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) transmission given the economic and social challenges these communities face. We surveyed low-income, predominantly Latinx residents receiving sexually transmitted infection testing and/or HIV/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) care in the lower Rio Grande Valley of southernmost Texas about their experiences of food insecurity. Participants aged 18 years and over took a self-administered survey available in English or Spanish in a clinic waiting room ( N = 251). Ordinary least squares regression results suggested that those with a prior HIV/AIDS diagnosis reported a response for food insecurity that was approximately 0.67 points higher than peers without a prior HIV/AIDS diagnosis (coefficient = 0.67; p < 0.05), even when adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics, social support, perceived discrimination, and neighborhood environment. Interaction results between age and HIV status indicated that younger individuals living with HIV/AIDS experienced uniquely higher food insecurity; those who reported a prior HIV/AIDS diagnosis experienced an additional reduction in food insecurity by approximately 0.06 points for each additional year of age (age × HIV/AIDS interaction coefficient = −0.06; p < 0.05). Community programs serving low-income populations should consider screening for and intervening on food insecurity, especially among young adults living with HIV/AIDS.

scholarly journals The mechanism and pattern of injuries of undocumented immigrants crossing the Texas-Mexico border along the Rio Grande Valley

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos H. Palacio ◽  
Bianca Cruz ◽  
Cheryl Vanier ◽  
Jose Cano ◽  
Bradford G. Scott
Keyword(s):  
Undocumented Immigrants ◽  
Surgical Intervention ◽  
Motor Vehicle ◽  
Temporal Trends ◽  
Rio Grande Valley ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
Increased Risk ◽  
Border Fence ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Extremity Injuries

Abstract Background Apprehensions of undocumented immigrants in the Rio Grande Valley sector of the U.S.-Mexico border have grown to account for nearly half of all apprehensions at the border. The purpose of this study is to report the prevalence, mechanism, and pattern of traumatic injuries sustained by undocumented immigrants who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border at the Rio Grande Valley sector over a span of 5 years and were treated at a local American College of Surgeons verified Level II trauma center. Methods A retrospective chart review was conducted from January 2014 to December 2019. Demographics, comorbidities, injury severity score (ISS), mechanism of injury, anatomical part of the body affected, hospital and ICU length of stay (LOS), and treatment costs were analyzed. Descriptive statistics for demographics, injury location and cause, and temporal trends are reported. The impact of ISS or surgical intervention on hospital LOS was analyzed using an analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). Results Of 178 patients, 65.2% were male with an average age of 31 (range 0–67) years old and few comorbidities (88.8%) or social risk factors (86%). Patients most commonly sustained injuries secondary to a border fence-related incident (33.7%), fleeing (22.5%), or motor vehicle accident (16.9%). There were no clear temporal trends in the total number of patients injured, or in causes of injury, between 2014 and 2019. The majority of patients (60.7%) sustained extremity injuries, followed by spine injuries (20.2%). Border fence-related incidents and fleeing increased risk of extremity injuries (Odds ratio (OR) > 3; p < 0.005), whereas motor vehicle accidents increased risk of head and chest injuries (OR > 4; p < 0.004). Extremity injuries increased the odds (OR: 9.4, p < 0.001) that surgery would be required. Surgical intervention was common (64%), and the median LOS of patients who underwent surgery was 3 days more than those who did not (p < 0.001). Conclusion In addition to border fence related injuries, undocumented immigrants also sustained injuries while fleeing and in motor vehicle accidents, among others. Extremity injuries, which were more likely with border fence-related incidents, were the most common type. This type of injury often requires surgical intervention and, therefore, a longer hospital stay for severe injuries.

scholarly journals A Comparative Analysis of the Attitudes toward the U.S.-Mexico Border Policy: Evaluating Perspectives on Border Security and Building a Wall in the Rio Grande Valley, National Hispanic and General U.S. Populations

2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 476-496
Author(s):  
Dongkyu Kim ◽  
Mi-son Kim ◽  
Natasha Altema McNeely
Keyword(s):  
Rio Grande Valley ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
Original Data ◽  
South Texas ◽  
Policy Attitudes ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Borderland Communities ◽  
General Populations ◽  
The U.S

Recently, there has been a surge of national attention toward the U.S.-Mexican border in South Texas, known as the Rio Grande Valley (RGV). Despite the attention and potential impact, which the wall would directly have on the RGV community, there has been no systemic attention paid to the opinions of the RGV residents regarding the proposed wall and other related immigration policies. This article, therefore, aims to fill this gap by comparing immigration policy attitudes in the borderland communities to both the national Hispanic and the general national populations. By utilizing original data from an RGV public opinion survey we conducted in 2018, our analysis shows that RGV residents hold more lenient immigration attitudes than do both the national Hispanic and the general populations. We utilize logistic regression analysis to further our understanding of the correlates of these attitudes across different samples. Our findings provide important policy and political implications.

Addressing high cervical cancer rates in the Rio Grande Valley along the Texas–Mexico border: a community-based initiative focused on education, patient navigation, and medical provider training/telementoring

2021 ◽  
pp. 175791392199461
Author(s):  
MP Salcedo ◽  
R Gowen ◽  
AM Rodriguez ◽  
S Fisher-Hoch ◽  
M Daheri ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cervical Cancer ◽  
Cancer Screening ◽  
Patient Navigation ◽  
Community Education ◽  
Cervical Dysplasia ◽  
Rio Grande Valley ◽  
Rio Grande ◽  
Medical Providers ◽  
Project Echo ◽  
Mexico Border

Aims: Cervical cancer incidence and mortality rates are approximately 55% higher in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) along the Texas–Mexico border compared with the average rates in the US. Our aim was to improve cervical cancer prevention efforts in the RGV through a comprehensive multilevel intervention initiative focused on community education, patient navigation, and training of local providers. Methods: We initiated a program in the RGV which consisted of (1) community education, (2) patient navigation, and (3) a training/mentoring program for local medical providers including hands-on training courses coupled with telementoring using Project ECHO® (Extension for Community Health Outcomes). We assessed the number of women undergoing cervical cancer screening, diagnosis, and treatment at three participating clinics caring for underserved women in the region. Results: From November 2014 to October 2018, 14,846 women underwent cervical cancer screening. A total of 2030 (13.7%) women underwent colposcopy for abnormal results (179% increase over baseline) and 453 women underwent loop electrosurgical excision procedures (LEEPs) for treatment of cervical dysplasia. Invasive cancer was diagnosed in 39 women who were navigated to a gynecologic oncologist for treatment. Seven local medical providers were trained to perform colposcopy and/or LEEP. Project ECHO telementoring videoconferences were held every 2 weeks for a total 101 sessions with an average of 22 participants per session and a total of 180 patient cases presented and discussed. Conclusions: Our program led to a large number of women undergoing diagnosis and treatment of cervical dysplasia in the RGV. If sustained, we anticipate these efforts will decrease cervical cancer rates in the region. The program is currently being expanded to additional underserved areas of Texas and globally to low- and middle-income countries.

MONARCHS, TRAVELLERS AND EMPIRE IN THE PACIFIC'S AGE OF REVOLUTIONS

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 77-96
Author(s):  
Sujit Sivasundaram
Keyword(s):  
Pacific Islanders ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Global History ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Cultural Terms ◽  
The Pacific Ocean ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Uk ◽  
A Site

AbstractThe Pacific has often been invisible in global histories written in the UK. Yet it has consistently been a site for contemplating the past and the future, even among Britons cast on its shores. In this lecture, I reconsider a critical moment of globalisation and empire, the ‘age of revolutions’ at the end of the eighteenth century and the start of the nineteenth century, by journeying with European voyagers to the Pacific Ocean. The lecture will point to what this age meant for Pacific islanders, in social, political and cultural terms. It works with a definition of the Pacific's age of revolutions as a surge of indigeneity met by a counter-revolutionary imperialism. What was involved in undertaking a European voyage changed in this era, even as one important expedition was interrupted by news from revolutionary Europe. Yet more fundamentally vocabularies and practices of monarchy were consolidated by islanders across the Pacific. This was followed by the outworkings of counter-revolutionary imperialism through agreements of alliance and alleged cessation. Such an argument allows me, for instance, to place the 1806 wreck of the Port-au-Prince within the Pacific's age of revolutions. This was an English ship used to raid French and Spanish targets in the Pacific, but which was stripped of its guns, iron, gunpowder and carronades by Tongans. To chart the trajectory from revolution and islander agency on to violence and empire is to appreciate the unsettled paths that gave rise to our modern world. This view foregrounds people who inhabited and travelled through the earth's oceanic frontiers. It is a global history from a specific place in the oceanic south, on the opposite side of the planet to Europe.

scholarly journals The elusive parasite: comparing macroscopic, immunological, and genomic approaches to identifying malaria in human skeletal remains from Sayala, Egypt (third to sixth centuries AD)

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alvie Loufouma Mbouaka ◽  
Michelle Gamble ◽  
Christina Wurst ◽  
Heidi Yoko Jäger ◽  
Frank Maixner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Diagnostic Tests ◽  
Sample Selection ◽  
Human Remains ◽  
Rapid Diagnostic Tests ◽  
Skeletal Remains ◽  
Pathological Changes ◽  
Human Skeletal Remains ◽  
The Past ◽  
A Site ◽  
Capture Sequencing

AbstractAlthough malaria is one of the oldest and most widely distributed diseases affecting humans, identifying and characterizing its presence in ancient human remains continue to challenge researchers. We attempted to establish a reliable approach to detecting malaria in human skeletons using multiple avenues of analysis: macroscopic observations, rapid diagnostic tests, and shotgun-capture sequencing techniques, to identify pathological changes, Plasmodium antigens, and Plasmodium DNA, respectively. Bone and tooth samples from ten individuals who displayed skeletal lesions associated with anaemia, from a site in southern Egypt (third to sixth centuries AD), were selected. Plasmodium antigens were detected in five of the ten bone samples, and traces of Plasmodium aDNA were detected in six of the twenty bone and tooth samples. There was relatively good synchronicity between the biomolecular findings, despite not being able to authenticate the results. This study highlights the complexity and limitations in the conclusive identification of the Plasmodium parasite in ancient human skeletons. Limitations regarding antigen and aDNA preservation and the importance of sample selection are at the forefront of the search for malaria in the past. We confirm that, currently, palaeopathological changes such as cribra orbitalia are not enough to be certain of the presence of malaria. While biomolecular methods are likely the best chance for conclusive identification, we were unable to obtain results which correspond to the current authentication criteria of biomolecules. This study represents an important contribution in the refinement of biomolecular techniques used; also, it raises new insight regarding the consistency of combining several approaches in the identification of malaria in past populations.

scholarly journals The two-sided spectacle at the border: Frontex, NGOs and the theatres of sovereignty

2021 ◽  
pp. 136248062110078
Author(s):  
Katja Franko
Keyword(s):  
Visual Analysis ◽  
Ethical Dilemmas ◽  
Moral Authority ◽  
Living Conditions ◽  
Coast Guard ◽  
The Past ◽  
Southern Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
A Site ◽  
Previous Scholarship

The Southern Mediterranean border has in the past decade become one of the most deeply contested political spaces in Europe and has been described as a site of the border spectacle. Drawing on textual and visual analysis of Twitter messages by two of the most prominent actors in the field, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, Frontex, and the humanitarian and medical NGO Médecins Sans Frontières, the article examines the split nature of the Mediterranean border which is, among others, visible in radically different narratives about migrants’ journeys, border deaths and living conditions. The findings challenge previous scholarship about convergence of humanitarianism and policing. The two actors are waging a fierce media battle for moral authority, where they use widely diverging strategies of claiming authority, each of which carries a particular set of ethical dilemmas.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document