Ethnography at the border / Pablo Vila, editor.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Vila, Pablo, 1952-

Series:

Cultural studies of the Americas ; v. 13.

Cultural studies of the Americas ; v. 13

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethnology--Mexican-American Border Region.

Ethnology.

Mexican-American Border Region--Social conditions.

Mexican-American Border Region.

Physical Description:

xxxv, 345 pages ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, [2003]

Summary:

For cultural theorists, "the border" has proven a fluid and hybrid space profitably explored for new ideas about identity, gender, and ethnicity. But for those who occupy this region, the border is not merely a metaphor, but a lived experience, yielding immediate, often pressing ambiguities, problems, and perils. Focusing on a particular area of the U.S.-Mexico border, Ciudad Juarez-El Paso, Ethnography at the Border brings out the complexity of the border experience through the voices of the diverse people who inhabit the region. In a series of ethnographic essays that investigate specific aspects of border existence, the contributors provide rich and detailed insights into such topics as life in illegal subdivisions, called colonias, in Texas; the experience of actually crossing the bridge between El Paso and Ciudad Juarez; the impact of Operation Blockade on illegal crossings; the controversy surrounding El Paso Border Patrol's proposal for a border wall in Sunland Park; the paradoxes of making "American products" using Mexican workers; and the relevance of grassroots efforts, environmental problems, and the multiple meanings of "Mexican." The final chapter offers a critique of the all too metaphorical border often depicted by cultural studies. Painstakingly conveying how the border looks and feels to those on both sides, Ethnography at the Border transmutes statistics on migration, labor markets, and economic trends--as well as conceptualizations of cross-cultural identities--into the experience, the observations, and the troubling lessons of border life.

Contents:

Introduction: Border Ethnographies / Pablo Vila ix

1. Reflections from the Bridge / Jessica Chapin 1

2. The Politics of Relocation: Gender, Nationality, and Value in a Mexican Maquiladora / Melissa W. Wright 23

3. Re-forming the "Traditional Mexican Woman": Making Subjects in a Border Factory / Leslie Salzinger 46

4. Gender and the Overlapping of Region, Nation, and Ethnicity on the U.S.

Mexico Border / Pablo Vila 73

5. The Polysemy of the Label "Mexican" on the Border / Pablo Vila 105

6. Metaphoric Enrichment and Material Poverty: The Making of "Colonias" / Sarah Hill 141

7. Aliens in Heterotopia: An Intertextual Reading of the Border Patrol Museum / Eduardo Barrera 166

8. Controlling the Border in El Paso del Norte: Operation Blockade or Operation Charade? / David Spener 182

9. The Border Wall Campaign: Democratic Debate versus Bureaucratic Authority / Tim J. Dunn 199

10. El Paso as an Eternal Yet Not Last Frontier / Victor Ortiz 236

11. Environmental Problems in Ciudad Juarez

El Paso: A Social Constructionist Approach / Pablo Vila, John A. Peterson 251

12. The Rearticulation of the Border Territory in the Stories of Rosario Sanmiguel / Maria Socorro Tabuenca Cordoba 279

Conclusion: The Limits of American Border Theory / Pablo Vila 306.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

0816640335

0816640343

OCLC:

50919953