Doctoral Dissertation Research: Central American Immigration on Mexico's Southern Border: Embodiments of Power, Citizenship, and Gender

作为国家的化身，中低层的“官员”，如官僚、教育工作者和边防人员，拥有通过日常行动规范移民公民身份和归属感的权力。 在墨西哥-危地马拉边境城市恰帕斯州的塔帕丘拉，中美洲移民的不断涌入以及随后制定的移民政策导致中低级别官员与移民之间的互动增加。 然而，人们对这些在实地工作的官员如何解释和执行他们的权力，他们的行动如何影响移民的经历和行使社会和政治公民权利，以及移民如何回应和谈判与这些官员的互动知之甚少。 由于他们的权力，低至中级官员可以影响移民易受剥削、家庭暴力和该区域日益普遍的其他侵犯人权行为的脆弱性。 本博士论文研究项目将描述低至中级官员在执行和解释移民政策方面的日常行动，并将展示低至中级官员如何支持或反对官方移民政策，并了解影响这些行动的制度规范。 该项目的其他目标是了解和描述中美洲移民与中低级别官员的经历，包括他们的经历如何因性别、族裔、种族和阶级而异，并描述中美洲移民因与官员互动而产生的政治公民身份和归属感。 博士生将借鉴和贡献于国家权力在女权主义地缘政治，女权主义移民研究和地理公民研究的微观尺度操作的理论。 该项目将采用定性、多方法的办法，其基础是与官员和中美洲移民进行深入访谈;与移民举办参与性讲习班;参与观察官员与移民在机构空间的互动。所有这些组成部分将有助于构建一个描述官员和移民如何谈判国家权力的制度人种学，该项目将扩大和加深对移民政策如何在实地实施和执行以及移民的反应的基本理解。该项目将有助于学术理论和对移民的理解，并将提供有助于改善官员与移民之间关系的信息和见解。 作为博士论文研究改进奖，该奖项还将提供支持，使有前途的学生建立一个强大的独立的研究生涯。

As embodiments of the state, low- to mid-level "officials," such as bureaucrats, educators, and border guards, possess the power to regulate immigrant citizenship and belonging through their everyday actions. In the Mexico-Guatemala border city of Tapachula, Chiapas, the growing inflow of Central American immigrants and the subsequent creation of immigration policies have led to increased interactions between low- to mid-level officials and immigrants. Very little is known, however, about how these officials working on the ground interpret and implement their powers on an everyday basis; how their actions impact immigrant experience and exercise of social and political citizenship rights; and how immigrants respond to and negotiate interactions with these officials. Because of their power, low- to mid-level officials can affect immigrants' vulnerability to exploitation, domestic violence and other human rights violations that are increasingly prevalent in the region. This doctoral dissertation research project will describe low- to mid-level officials' everyday actions in implementing and interpreting migration policy, and it will demonstrate how low- to mid-level officials support or contradict official migration policies and understand the institutional norms that influence these actions. Additional objectives of this project are to understand and describe Central American immigrants' experiences with low- to mid-level officials, including how their experience varies across gender, ethnicity, race, and class, and to describe Central American immigrants' feelings of political citizenship and belonging as a result of their interactions with officials. The doctoral student will draw upon and contribute to theories on the micro-scale operations of state power in feminist geopolitics, feminist migration studies, and citizenship studies in geography. The project will employ a qualitative, multi-method approach based on in-depth interviews with officials and Central American immigrants; participatory workshops with immigrants; and participant observation of officials' interactions with immigrants in institutional spaces. All of these components will contribute to the construction of an institutional ethnography describing how officials and immigrants negotiate state power.This project will broaden and deepen basic understanding regarding how migration policies are implemented and enforced on the ground as well as the resulting responses of immigrants. The project will contribute to academic theory and understandings of migration, and it will provide information and insights that will contribute to efforts to improve relationships between officials and immigrants. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this award also will provide support to enable a promising student to establish a strong independent research career.