Afterlives of Mexican Migration: Necro-ethnographies of (Im)mobility

• In Event: Ethnographies of Migration and Displacement

Abstract

This paper introduces “necro-ethnography” as an epistemological, ontological and politico-ethical frame to theorize the experiences of communities and subjects whose conditions of life and death have been radically impinged upon by nefarious forms of state power. While necro-ethnography as method (and praxis) can be deployed wherever subjects’ life chances are stripped away by political forces, the present paper fleshes out necro-ethnography in the cultural and historical specificity of two sub-collectivities of Mexican migrants and their kin who are living in the shadow of migration and family separation. The first sub-group is comprised of recently deported Mexican nationals and their (often U.S.-born) progeny while the second consists of elderly Mexican parents with long-estranged undocumented children in the U.S. Within the orbit of the Mexican state, both of these sub-populations have been the targets of government programs and policies, analyzed here in the case of Zacatecas. The first is a conditional cash transfer program for recently deported Mexican nationals who invest those funds in small-scale ventures in their hometowns. The second is a program known as Corazón de Plata (Heart of Silver) that assists elderly parents with undocumented children in the U.S. obtain tourist visas to reunite with their long-estranged offspring living on the other side of the border. Deploying necro-ethnography in the context of Trump and AMLO populisms, this paper raises the question: how do these sub-collectivities of migrants and their families navigate state-imposed (im)mobilities and strive for an “ethical survival” in the long afterlife of Mexican migration (Schmidt Camacho 2008)?

Author

• Adrián Félix, University of California Riverside