Overview

"San Diego and Tijuana are the site of a national border enforcement spectacle, but they are also neighboring cities with deeply intertwined histories, cultures, and economies. In Unequal Neighbors, Kristen Hill Maher and David Carruthers shift attention from the national border to a local one, examining the role of place stigma in reinforcing actual and imagined inequalities between these cities. Widespread ""bordered imaginaries"" in San Diego represent it as a place of economic vitality, safety, and order, while stigmatizing Tijuana as a zone of poverty, crime, and corruption. These dualisms misrepresent complex realities on the ground, but they also have real material effects: the vision of a local border benefits some actors in the region while undermining others. Based on a wide range of original empirical materials, the book examines how asymmetries between these cities have been produced and reinforced through stigmatizing representations of Tijuana in media, everyday talk, economic relations, and local tourism discourse and practices. However, both place stigma and borders are subject to contestation, and the book also examines ""debordering"" practices and counter-narratives about Tijuana's image. While the details of the book are particular to this corner of the world, the kinds of processes it documents offer a window into the making of unequal neighbors more broadly. The dynamics at the Tijuana border present a framework for understanding how inequalities that manifest in cultural practices produce asymmetric borders between places."

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9780197557198

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Reviews

Drawing on diverse sources of information, the authors have reconstructed images and imaginaries that for over a century San Diego's multiple urban actors have constructed about Tijuana, the neighboring city across the border. In their interpretations of these reconstructions, they have identified, in both opinion and praxis, features that show a willingness for more openness (debordering) as well as for more closure (bordering) of the international border between the cities. For this achievement, among others, I highly recommend this book. -- Tito Alegr a, author of Metr polis Transfronteriza Unequal Neighbors is impressive in its scope and ingenuity, in its use of multiple qualitative methods, in the questions it poses, and the open and nuanced ways in which it probes for answers. Maher and Carruthers have written a complex yet highly readable book that is certain to have broad reach in classrooms, among scholars, and in policy circles alike. -- Maria Lorena Cook, Cornell University Through engaging stories and incisive analysis, Maher and Carruthers bring the vibrant and misunderstood city of Tijuana to life. A must-read for those interested in the US-Mexico border. -- Reece Jones, author of White Borders: The History of Race and Immigration in the United States from Chinese Exclusion to the Border Wall Unequal Neighbors plunges us into the everyday worlds of storytelling and stereotyping that create, sustain, and sometimes dissolve inequality across one of the most legendarily unequal borders in the world. This multi-layered, multi-perspectival portrait of 'image work' between Tijuana and San Diego shows how, beyond state security projects and national media representations, local processes of bordering and debordering remain fundamental to borders' role in producing economic and racial inequality globally. Accessible and lively, the book will be enlightening for anyone interested in urban studies, borders, inequality, or US-Mexico relations. -- Rihan Yeh, University of California, San Diego

This book provides a unique perspective thanks to its focus on the local level and a vast array of evidence, including historical records, interviews, photographs, and several different methodologies, including historical archival research, interpretive analysis of discourse and images, and content analysis. ... Although the book places its argument in an academic context, the case study chapters are accessible to broader audiences. Highly recommended. * CHOICE * Drawing on diverse sources of information, the authors have reconstructed images and imaginaries that for over a century San Diego's multiple urban actors have constructed about Tijuana, the neighboring city across the border. In their interpretations of these reconstructions, they have identified, in both opinion and praxis, features that show a willingness for more openness (debordering) as well as for more closure (bordering) of the international border between the cities. For this achievement, among others, I highly recommend this book. * Tito Alegria, author of Metropolis Transfronteriza * Unequal Neighbors is impressive in its scope and ingenuity, in its use of multiple qualitative methods, in the questions it poses, and the open and nuanced ways in which it probes for answers. Maher and Carruthers have written a complex yet highly readable book that is certain to have broad reach in classrooms, among scholars, and in policy circles alike. * Maria Lorena Cook, Cornell University * Through engaging stories and incisive analysis, Maher and Carruthers bring the vibrant and misunderstood city of Tijuana to life. A must-read for those interested in the US-Mexico border. * Reece Jones, author of White Borders: The History of Race and Immigration in the United States from Chinese Exclusion to the Border Wall * Unequal Neighbors plunges us into the everyday worlds of storytelling and stereotyping that create, sustain, and sometimes dissolve inequality across one of the most legendarily unequal borders in the world. This multi-layered, multi-perspectival portrait of 'image work' between Tijuana and San Diego shows how, beyond state security projects and national media representations, local processes of bordering and debordering remain fundamental to borders' role in producing economic and racial inequality globally. Accessible and lively, the book will be enlightening for anyone interested in urban studies, borders, inequality, or US-Mexico relations. * Rihan Yeh, University of California, San Diego *

The authors' exploration of place stigma, the ways it is created and maintained, and the uses it has for border residents, particularly but not only those on the relatively wealthier side, make an excellent contribution to border studies and deserves to be widely read. * James Gerber, Journal of Borderlands Studies * highly Recommended * M. L. Keck, CHOICE * This book provides a unique perspective thanks to its focus on the local level and a vast array of evidence, including historical records, interviews, photographs, and several different methodologies, including historical archival research, interpretive analysis of discourse and images, and content analysis. ... Although the book places its argument in an academic context, the case study chapters are accessible to broader audiences. Highly recommended. * CHOICE * Drawing on diverse sources of information, the authors have reconstructed images and imaginaries that for over a century San Diego's multiple urban actors have constructed about Tijuana, the neighboring city across the border. In their interpretations of these reconstructions, they have identified, in both opinion and praxis, features that show a willingness for more openness (debordering) as well as for more closure (bordering) of the international border between the cities. For this achievement, among others, I highly recommend this book. * Tito Alegría, author of Metrópolis Transfronteriza * Unequal Neighbors is impressive in its scope and ingenuity, in its use of multiple qualitative methods, in the questions it poses, and the open and nuanced ways in which it probes for answers. Maher and Carruthers have written a complex yet highly readable book that is certain to have broad reach in classrooms, among scholars, and in policy circles alike. * Maria Lorena Cook, Cornell University * Through engaging stories and incisive analysis, Maher and Carruthers bring the vibrant and misunderstood city of Tijuana to life. A must-read for those interested in the US-Mexico border. * Reece Jones, author of White Borders: The History of Race and Immigration in the United States from Chinese Exclusion to the Border Wall * Unequal Neighbors plunges us into the everyday worlds of storytelling and stereotyping that create, sustain, and sometimes dissolve inequality across one of the most legendarily unequal borders in the world. This multi-layered, multi-perspectival portrait of 'image work' between Tijuana and San Diego shows how, beyond state security projects and national media representations, local processes of bordering and debordering remain fundamental to borders' role in producing economic and racial inequality globally. Accessible and lively, the book will be enlightening for anyone interested in urban studies, borders, inequality, or US-Mexico relations. * Rihan Yeh, University of California, San Diego *

Author Information

Kristen Hill Maher is Associate Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University. David Carruthers is Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University.

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