Overview

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

Full Product Details

9781478020257

Table of Contents

Reviews

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 which 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 Diaz-Barriga, coauthor of * Fencing in Democracy: Border Walls, Necrocitizenship, and the Security State *

Author Information

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.

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