Gendering Deportability: Undocumented Mexican Parents Articulating Deportation Concerns

• In Event: 1564 - Gender and Immigration

Abstract

For undocumented immigrants, deportability or the possibility of being removed from a country is an experience immigrants must manage. It stands, however, that deportability may be a gendered experience that can distinctly shape women’s and men’s family plans. This research asks: how do Mexican undocumented immigrant parents plan for deportation? What are the lives and concerns they imagine post-deportation? Building on the concept of “mental work” that has been applied to work/family feminist scholarship, I find that women and men think about deportation in ways that complicate, as well as uphold gender. Both mothers and fathers largely prefer to leave children in the U.S. if they are deported, but beyond this, parents do different types of gendered “mental work” when it comes to their deportability. Mothers concern themselves with caregiving arrangements while fathers discuss breadwinning concerns. Transgressing gendered norms, men’s reflections on deportability also allows them to break away from some of the confines of hegemonic masculinity to express fear, sadness, and familial loss. This research urges gender and migration scholars to consider how deportability is gendered and that undocumented mothers and fathers require distinct supports.

Author

• Cassaundra Rodriguez, University of Nevada, Las Vegas