Investigating Cross-Border Experiences Living at the U.S.-Mexico Border

• In Event: Analyzing and Confronting precariedades, exclusiones y emergencias among Latino Youth

Abstract

My study seeks to explore the experiences of young adults crossing the international boundary between the U.S. and Mexico, primarily between the years of 2006 and 2014, when economic and social conditions in Mexico caused changes to the everyday activities of people who traversed borders for work, school or to visit family at the U.S.-Mexico border or throughout Mexico. I will explore how these economic and political conditions in Mexico shape the tensions and conflicts that exist in these geographic areas, and how these conditions in the greater borderlands have impacted young people living at the Border, their everyday realities of work, school, travel, home life, and life in general. I will also explore what the impact of violence is by authorities and non-authorities on both sides of the international border. I will use in-depth interviews, focus groups and participant observation at local community events to understand how people experience the geographic realities of living at the Borderlands, how they understand violence, and how they see it having an impact on their everyday lives and functionality.

Author

• Cynthia Bejarano, New Mexico State University