“I Cannot Erase Myself”: Persistence of Transnational Mexican-origin Families’ Ways of Knowing

• In Event: Roundtable Session 110
  In Roundtable Session: Transnationalism, Religion, and Social Identity

Abstract

Many Mexican immigrant families in the U.S. have transnational characteristics which go largely ignored in U.S. schools. This paper examines the persistence of Mexican transnational families' ways of knowing, or how people understand and act upon the world. In four working-class, Mexican-origin family critical ethnographic case studies, I examine their ways of knowing. Drawing from transnational theory, findings indicate that these families have complex lenses of understanding regarding their identity, their sense of accountability to their extended communities, and an intersectionality of resistance and resisilience while facing oppressions in schools. These understandings can be used to enhance how transnational students are taught and can also help all students learn to participate as global citizens.

Author

• G. Sue Kasun, University of Saint Thomas