Beyond the Transaction: Remittance Spaces as Transnational Nodes in the Capital Region

• In Event: Economic Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Roundtable 7: Networks, Embeddedness, and Markets

Abstract

This project investigates the dense concentration of remittance service providers (RSPs) in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, with a specific focus on the neighborhoods of Columbia Heights, Washington, D.C., Takoma Park, Maryland, and Chirilagua in Alexandria, Virginia. Arguing that these spaces are more than points of international transactions, but rather an important socio-cultural infrastructure for immigrant communities. The central research questions are: How do the spatial distribution and aesthetics of RSPs produce and reflect the cultural identity of these neighborhoods? What do these spaces reveal about the financial and social lives of migrant communities? Finally, in what ways are these spaces meaningful places for the performance of transnational identity? These questions go beyond the economic aspects of remittances to explore how global migration and transnationalism are physically and socially performed within an urban landscape. To answer these questions, this project employs a mixed-methods approach, utilizing ArcGIS mapping software to document and create “ heat maps” of RSPs in the selected neighborhoods, ethnographic observation within and directly outside select RSPs, and content analysis of environmental messaging (signs, ads, etc.). This research is grounded in a theoretical framework combining Lefebvre's sociology of space and Michael Foucault's ideas of "heterotopias," or the othering of certain cultural, institutional, and public spaces.

Author

• Matthew Hernandez, George Washington University