Formerly Undocumented Activists

2020 ◽  
pp. 105-132
Author(s):  
Kevin Escudero
Keyword(s):  
Women Of Color ◽  
Women Activists ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Future Generation ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Undocumented Immigrant ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Undocumented Status ◽  
Immigrant Rights Movement

This chapter profiles the experiences of a group of individuals whose experiences are not often discussed within the literature on undocumented migration: formerly undocumented individuals. Focusing on the case of formerly undocumented immigrant women activists who have continued their involvement in the immigrant rights movement after adjusting their immigration status, the chapter highlights the importance of these organizers’ identities as women, people of color, and formerly undocumented individuals. Of the formerly undocumented women of color activists interviewed for this book, the majority discussed their efforts in providing mentorship to what they refer to as the future generation of undocumented activists. Through examples of roles as graduate students, musicians, and full-time organizers, these individuals’ experiences draw attention to the fluid, shifting nature of immigrant legal status, as well as the resonance of undocumented status in the lives of those who are no longer undocumented.

scholarly journals Dynamics of Distinction and Solidarity within Social Movements: Explaining Relations between Privileged and Underprivileged Groups in the U.S. Immigrant Rights Movement

2021 ◽  
pp. 073112142199006
Author(s):  
Walter Nicholls ◽  
Justus Uitermark ◽  
Sander van Haperen
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Undocumented Immigrants ◽  
Undocumented Immigrant ◽  
Undocumented Migrants ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Considerable Success ◽  
American Immigrant ◽  
Immigrant Rights Movement ◽  
The Media ◽  
The U.S

Undocumented immigrant youths, known as the Dreamers, rose to exceptional prominence in the American immigrant rights movement in the 2000s and 2010s. The Dreamers had considerable success in presenting themselves as assimilated and hard-working patriots worthy of regularization. While this strategy worked well in the media and politics, it also created a distance between the Dreamers and less privileged groups of undocumented immigrants. In 2013, just when they were widely recognized as legitimate, the Dreamers made the remarkable move to change their strategy: rather than presenting themselves as model immigrants uniquely worthy of regularization, they began mobilizing for policies benefiting all undocumented migrants. By documenting and explaining this change in strategy, this paper addresses the broader question of what separates and binds privileged and underprivileged subgroups in social movements.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 133-144
Author(s):  
Kevin Escudero
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Coalition Building ◽  
Undocumented Immigrant ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Marginalized Groups ◽  
Refugee Community ◽  
Immigrant Rights Movement ◽  
Immigrant And Refugee

This book concludes with an analysis of how the Identity Mobilization Model and its illustration of movement activists’ efforts to leverage the use of an intersectional movement identity continue to resonate with organizers in the immigrant rights movement and broader social movement contexts as well. In particular, the conclusion points to the immigrant rights movement’s growing emphasis on black undocumented immigrant and transgender undocumented immigrant activist identities as well as the potential for coalition building and allyship with the Muslim immigrant and refugee community. By examining the continued manifestations of an intersectional movement identity in the immigrant rights movement and beyond, the conclusion underscores the importance of such a framework for understanding the movement’s future and its promise to bring about meaningful, transformative social change for immigrants and other members of marginalized groups.

Organizing While Undocumented

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Escudero
Keyword(s):  
Immigrant Youth ◽  
The United States ◽  
Social Identities ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Undocumented Immigrant ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
The World ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Do So

Undocumented immigrants in the United States who take part in social movement activism do so at great risk: the threat of deportation. Despite this risk, undocumented immigrant youth have been at the forefront of the national movement for immigrant rights. In their activism these youth have leveraged their identities as immigrants but also as queer individuals, people of color, and women. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews with Asian undocumented, undocumented and queer (undocuqueer), and formerly undocumented activists, Organizing While Undocumented examines these activists’ cultivation of and strategic use of an intersectional movement identity. Through the development of the Identity Mobilization Model, the book highlights three critical strategies that undocumented immigrant youth have utilized when deploying an intersectional movement identity. Ultimately, this book argues that undocumented immigrant youth have challenged the notion that their immigration status wholly defines their lived experiences and, in the process, emphasized the importance of their multiple social identities. This emphasis has in turn allowed undocumented activists to connect their struggle to a broader set of social justice struggles taking place in the world today.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Kevin Escudero
Keyword(s):  
Social Movement ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
Immigrant Youth ◽  
Coalition Building ◽  
Undocumented Immigrant ◽  
Undocumented Immigration ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Scholarly Literature ◽  
Road Map ◽  
Immigrant Rights Movement

The introduction provides an overview of the immigrant rights movement and the emergence of a prominent contingent of undocumented immigrant youth at its forefront. These youth have strategically and purposefully leveraged the use of an intersectional movement identity to in turn facilitate coalition building with members of similarly situated groups. The introduction lays out the book’s theoretical intervention in the scholarly literature on undocumented immigration and social movement activism and its methodological approach. It also includes a road map of the later ethnographic and interview-based chapters.

Familial Moralities: Moral (Re)source of Commitment in the Immigrant Rights Movement in El Paso, Texas

2021 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 225-246
Author(s):  
Alejandro Márquez
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
El Paso ◽  
Immigrant Family ◽  
Immigrant Rights ◽  
Everyday Activities ◽  
Care Givers ◽  
Strenuous Work ◽  
Immigrant Rights Movement

Social movement scholars acknowledge the importance of morality in joining and shaping social movements. There is less knowledge about the content of morality that keeps social movement participants committed, once in. Moral commitments, I argue, emerge from the work conducted within social movements. By looking at everyday activities in the immigrant rights movement in El Paso, Texas, I analyze how commitment is shaped through the caregiving practices of staff and volunteers within two organizations serving immigrants and asylum seekers on the border: Compromiso and Casa Asuncion. Despite the strenuous work involved, I find care givers in these two organizations make sense of their continued participation by drawing on what I call familial moralities. At Compromiso, a legal aid office, caregivers reflect on their or others’ immigrant family histories, creating an intellectual attachment to the work through family. At Casa Asuncion, a migrant shelter, caregivers draw on new familial roles with migrants and the shelter staff, creating an emotional attachment as family.

scholarly journals Intersectionality, Identity Politics and Violence Against Women of Color

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw
Keyword(s):  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
Women Of Color ◽  
White Women ◽  
Racial Violence ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Racial Stratification ◽  
Race And Gender ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Experiences Of Women

Identity-based politics has been a source of strength for people of color, gays and lesbians, among others. The problem with identity politics is that it often conflates intra group differences. Exploring the various ways in which race and gender intersect in shaping structural and political aspects of violence against these women, it appears the interests and experiences of women of color are frequently marginalized within both feminist  and antiracist discourses. Both discourses have failed to consider the intersections of racism and patriarchy. However,  the location of women of color at the intersection of race and gender makes our actual experience of domestic violence, rape, and remedial reform quite different from that of white women. Similarly, both feminist and antiracist politics have functioned in tandem to marginalize the issue of violence against women of color. The effort to politicize violence against women will do little to address the experiences of nonwhite women until the ramifications of racial stratification among women are acknowledged. At the same time, the anti-racist agenda will not be furthered by suppressing the reality of intra-racial violence against women of color. The effect of both these marginalizations is that women of color have no ready means to link their experiences with those of other women.

Pose and HIV/AIDS

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 615-624
Author(s):  
Laura Stamm
Keyword(s):  
Women Of Color ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Trans People ◽  
Aids Crisis ◽  
Trans Women ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Living With Hiv ◽  
Hiv Aids

Abstract This article examines how the television series Pose (2018–) represents queer and trans people of color living with HIV/AIDS at the height of the crisis in 1987. While the series portrays an important part of transgender history, it also positions the AIDS crisis as something that is done and part of America's past. Despite the fact that rates of HIV infection remain at epidemic rates for trans women of color, Pose, like many other mainstream media representations, suggests that the AIDS crisis ended in 1995. The series brings trans women of color's experiences to a record number of viewers, but that representation comes with a certain cost—the cost of historicization.

Second to None

2019 ◽  
pp. 211-225 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ginny Jones Boss ◽  
Tiffany J. Davis ◽  
Christa J. Porter ◽  
Candace M. Moore
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Women Of Color ◽  
Structuration Theory ◽  
Contingent Faculty ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Critical Race Feminism ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Gender And Age ◽  
Barriers And Opportunities ◽  
Experiences Of Women

The purpose of this chapter is to foreground the experiences of women of Color who serve in full-time, contingent faculty roles and interrogate the policies and practices that present both barriers and opportunities for these faculty members within the academy. Using a conceptual framework of previous literature in combination with critical race feminism and structuration theory, the authors discuss the ways in which identity (race, gender, and age) and position (contingent vs. tenure-track) influence faculty life and teaching. Throughout this discussion, the authors also introduce results from a study they conducted on Black women contingent faculty. The chapter concludes with the authors offering suggestions for institutional policy and practice.

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