Week 4 Discussion

Alvarez: "Borders & borderlands graphically illustrate the conflicts and contradiction in a hierarchically organized world."

Heyman: "International boundaries are edges of the rules of the game in two important ways. First, they are places where state bureaucracies regulate who and what can enter the territorialized rules". "Second, boundaries are places where territorial outsiders first encounter rules of the game that have been routinized to the state territory as a whole"

• Alvarez

• Heyman

• I don't agree with either definition of the border

• I agree with both

Alvarez: "Migrants as labor, are enticed by and allowed into US labor markets, yet are regulated and controlled as commodities without a legitimate bilateral accommodation in the market"

Heyman: "Border control over human migration is not inherent. During the initial expansion of capital, states permitted the active recruitment of new migrants, in keeping with the deterritorializing character of capital"

• Alvarez

• Heyman

• I don't with their agree with either opinion on the genesis of migration to the US

• I agree with both scholars

Alvarez: " We need more ethnographic work that specifically focuses on the role of the border in order to tease out the ways in which the myriad types of people negotiate life".

Heyman: "The Mexico/U.S. border requires specification of ecologies of state and capital"

• Alvarez

• Heyman

• I don't agree with either suggestions for research

• I agree with both suggestions

In Alvarez's reading he described how borders, especially the U.S-Mexican border were underlooked by anthropoligist, and once they were studied there were "cross cultural misunderstandings", then later these anthropologist were labeled as racist. What are the aspects that led to a new approach in studying the borders and our understnadings behind the political and individual livlihoods in the areas?

1. Heyman’s article references the long-haul trucker ethnography by Collier and Álvarez, describing how the truckers “use ethnicity, within this their specific cultural idioms of interpersonal trust, to reinforce networks.” What other types of identity networks transcend state-defined border systems?

In The Mexican-US Border: The Making of an Anthropology of Borderlands by Robert R. Alvarez Jr, he writes about borderland culture and identity and its links to conflicts and contradictions. He writes on page 449, “National and individual identities are continually contested, shifted, and accommodated.” Can you think of any social or cultural contradictions along the borderlands? How have these contradictions shaped your community and/or identity?

1. Gloria Anzaldua argues that living on the border creates this state of limbo. Individuals believe they don’t belong to either the Mexican culture or the American culture because they will never be Mexican enough or American enough. Is this true? What culture is unique to the RGV/borderland?

1. The author states, “Anthropologists study migration from the perspective of the actor.” Why is studying from the perspective of the actor important? And how does it change the view of migration?

Alvarez discusses two kinds of borderland scholars: the “literalist” and the “a-literalists.” The literalist focus “on the actual problems of the border.” (See examples on pg. 5.) While the a-literalists focus on “social boundaries on the geopolitical border” and more generalized topics. What are the benefits of the two separate approaches? Does one work better than the other? What is your personal preference as a scholar?

A lot of artists and activists find ways to bring injustices, or grievences to light in any way they know how. Before taking this class or reading this, have you listened to music that had political messages throughout the song? Specifically songs about belonging, or being part of a nation, and more importantly did you know what the message was conveying?