From the Archives . . . The Wall: Oppression and Resistance by Sumita S. Chakravarty Anna Funder, Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall (Harper Perennial, 2000) Australian journalist Anna Funder’s study of life under authoritarianism in the former East Germany. Keywords: surveillance state, wall, deportation, authoritarianism **** At the end the Stasi had …
“A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary.” (25) – Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza Echoes from the Borderlands is an exceedingly relevant and poignant exploration of the U.S./Mexico Border that …
Alex Rivera provides a poignant commentary on labor, ecology, racial capitalism, and imperial infrastructure in his futuristic, science fiction film Sleep Dealer. The film is set in a dystopian future of North America where Mexican water rights are in the control of multinational corporations and the border between the United States and Mexico is completely …
The Night Fisherman (2020) by Far Few Giants is a narrative-driven adventure game. As a short, free game that may be played through in about 10 minutes, it is a micro-fiction that is experienced like a filmic vignette. In an atmospheric setting that is awash in a violet color palette, the player assumes the role …
Described as a “dystopian document thriller,” Papers, Please is a 2013 video game designed by Lucas Pope and published by 3090 across several platforms. Playing as an immigration inspector, the game unfolds through increasingly bureaucratic duties of processing paperwork at the border of fictional Artstotzka. Sorting through passports, immigration documents, and personal information, the player …
Directed by Daphne Matziaraki, 4.1 Miles is a story about a Hellenic coast guard captain on a small Greek island who suddenly becomes in charge of saving thousands of refugees from drowning during the European migration crisis gives the viewers hope for humanity. The film was a winner of the David L. Wolper Student …
From ARTNET.com: Artist Cosimo Cavallaro is helping President Donald Trump build his controversial border wall between the US and Mexico—but his barrier is constructed not from steel and concrete, but from blocks of cotija cheese. “I don’t like walls,” said the immigrant artist in a video promoting the project. “This is a wall that I’m willing to live with. …
Ronald Rael, Borderwall As Architecture: A Manifesto for the U.S.-Mexico Boundary (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2017) From the Publisher: “Through a series of propositions suggesting that the nearly seven hundred miles of wall is an opportunity for economic and social development along the border that encourages its conceptual and physical dismantling, the book …
The HBO network show ‘Last Week Tonight With John Oliver’ breaks down the current state of legal migration in the United States after a summer of lies about the migration process from the president of the United States. Oliver addresses the the concept of the ‘invisible wall,’ the slowdown in the bureaucratic process of approving …
2016–17 “MIGRATION AND COMMUNICATION FLOWS: RETHINKING BORDERS, CONFLICT AND IDENTITY THROUGH THE DIGITAL” November 2-3 2017 – Bilbao, Spain “We are faced with a crisis of humanity, and the only exit from this crisis is to recognize our growing interdependence as a species and to find new ways to live together in solidarity and cooperation, …
Here is a collection of some of the design submissions for the borders meant to divide Mexico and the U.S.A, providing visual references for the architecture of borders. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/04/05/522712279/photos-the-many-possible-shapes-of-trumps-border-wall
2015 “MIGRATION, MEDIA AND INTERCULTURAL DIALOGUE,” 25-26 NOVEMBER 2015, UNITED NATIONS UNIVERSITY, BARCELONA “TRANSIENT MIGRATION IN THE ASIA-PACIFIC: IDENTITIES, SOCIAL NETWORKS AND MEDIA,” 12 NOVEMBER 2015, RMIT UNIVERSITY, MELBOURNE “MANAGING BORDERS,” 3-4 APRIL 2015, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK “GENDER, CULTURE & MIGRATION,” 6-7 MARCH 2015, UNIVERSITY OF GDANSK, POLAND 2014 “DETERMINANTS OF INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION,” 23–25 …
2011-2016 Scott Blinder and William L. Allen. “Constructing Immigrants: Portrayals of Migrant Groups in British National Newspapers, 2010–2012.” International Migration Review. Spring 2016. Shepard, Mark. “Minor Urbanism: Everyday Entanglements of Technology and Urban Life”Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies, 2013 (v 27, no. 4), 483 – 494 BECK, Ulrich AND DANIEL LEVY, “COSMOPOLITANIZED NATIONS: RE-IMAGINING COLLECTIVITY IN WORLD RISK …
2011-12 CELIK, IPEK A. IN PERMANENT CRISIS: ETHNICITY IN CONTEMPORARY EUROPEAN MEDIA AND CINEMA. ANN ARBOR: UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN PRESS, 2015. MARTIN, Susan. A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS. CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2012. MOORE, KERRY, BERNHARD GROSS AND TERRY THREADGOLD. EDS. MIGRATIONS AND THE MEDIA. NY: PETER LANG, 2012. JONES, Amelia. SEEING DIFFERENTLY: A HISTORY AND THEORY OF IDENTIFICATION AND THE VISUAL …
On Paper: Visual Artist Jesse Chun explores visual rhetoric involved in identity and mobility through an appropriation and transformation of the familiar marks contained in immigration documents. On Paper was shown from July until October 2016 at the Spencer Brownstone Gallery in New York City. Brooklyn-based multidisciplinary artist Jesse Chun explores interdependencies between aspects of identity, …
Director: Chantal Akerman 2002 “Sometimes the absence is stronger than the presence” One of the striking features of Chantal Akerman’s documentary, ‘From the Other Side,’ is that so often the faces of Mexicans captured in the film are blurry, as if to underscore their anonymity and invisibility in terms of the long history …
“Hungarian fashion photographer Norbert Baksa has come under fire for a refugee-themed fashion photo shoot he conceptualized and shot at the Hungarian border. “Der Migrant,” which features models wearing headscarves and designer duds before a backdrop of barbed wire fences, was released on the photographer’s personal website and Twitter account last week to predictably less-than-stellar reviews. …
“My sister has asked me what my perspective is on the death of thousands of refugees in Europe this summer. Herewith. There is obviously a spatial aspect to the immigration crisis unfolding in Europe. The question is whether there is also an answer to be found in the framing, forming, and allocation of space. Some …
From the LA Times: “The Vatican has said that Pope Francis’ journey through Mexico, which takes him from the southern state of Chiapas to the northern border with Texas, symbolically traces the route of migrants trying to reach the United States. Five Central American migrants attempting that journey reflect on their faith and the pope’s …
Maziad Aloush, a former school teacher fleeing the Syrian war, led his band of refugees through five countries—across the Mediterranean sea and through forests and around mountains—before they eventually disbanded near the border of Austria and Germany. Like so many of the hundreds of thousands of refugees pouring into Europe to escape war and deprivation, he …
They ran in the dark towards the Austria-Hungary border. Some had flashlights. Some scampered through the shadows. Some were registered under UN regulations, others were not. They did not know where they were going and they did not know what would happen to them. They ran, hungry, thirsty and blind. This was the scene when …
Refugees and migrants are scattered all across this island. They wash their clothes on the beach below the crumbling ramparts of a 1,400-year-old castle that once defended Lesbos. They camp in tents in the parks. At night, they trudge past bars and restaurants where Greeks drink ouzo and dine on grilled fish. But the wave …
Although immigration is a dominant topic in contemporary culture, its discussion is often limited to the human experience, such as the crossing of borders and issues about national identity. The Journeys exhibition at the CCA takes a different perspective: how movements impact on the environment. Examples range from the coconut that can drift freely on …
“There are 2,771 crosses, so 2,771 human remains since 2000,” says Cristen Vernon Coalición de Derechos Humanos, Missing Migrant Hotline coordinator for Derechos Humanos. That number, she says, only accounts for a fraction of those who have died along the entire U.S.-Mexico border. More than 6,330 people have died along the southwest border with Mexico …
Leo Chavez, UCI professor of anthropology and Chicano/Latino studies, has been researching immigration for more than 25 years. He has written a book on the ways immigrants are represented in the media and popular discourse in the U.S. Video by Kerrin Piche Serna, University Communications. Video: Leo Chavez: Why Immigration Reform Is So Difficult: Latinos as …
by Paul Kramer, The New Yorker. “The whole point of setting the border between Mexico and the United States at the deepest channel of the Rio Grande was that the river was not supposed to move. That was the thinking in 1848, when, following Mexico’s defeat by the United States and surrender of its vast …
MY DETAINMENT STORY OR: HOW I LEARNED TO STOP FEELING SAFE IN MY OWN COUNTRY AND HATE BORDER AGENTS* Earlier this month, OTM producer Sarah Abdurrahman, her family, and her friends were detained for hours by US Customs and Border Protection on their way home from Canada. Everyone being held was a US citizen, and …
Syrian refugee Hashem Alsouki risks his life crossing the Mediterranean, his sights set on Sweden – and freedom for his family. In the darkness far out to sea, Hashem Alsouki can’t see his neighbours but he can hear them scream. It’s partly his fault. They are two African women – perhaps from Somalia, but now …
Objects left behind by undocumented migrants on their journey into the United States, including backpacks, water bottles, and border restrains, form the basis of this exhibition looking at the human experience of crossing the U.S./Mexico border. Viewers are asked to consider the complexities of the found objects through video and images created on location along …
Through powerful footage and intimate access, THE STATE OF ARIZONA focuses on the controversial “papers please” law, SB1070. The feature-length, verité documentary interweaves the volatile themes of immigration and race portrayed through a mosaic of characters and their responses to the law. The film’s three-act structure is built around the turbulent arc of the law, …
Lilja 4-ever (2002)Lilja 4-ever is a 2002 Swedish-Danish drama film directed by Lukas Moodysson. Lilja 4-ever is an unremittingly brutal and realistic story of the downward spiral of Lilja, played by Oksana Akinshina, a girl in the former Soviet Union whose mother abandons her to move to the United States. The story is loosely based …
The Undocumented (2013) Marcos Hernandez lives and works in Chicago. He came to the United States from Mexico, after a life-threatening border crossing through the Sonora Desert in southern Arizona. Each month, he sends money to his mother in Mexico City to buy medicine for his brother, Gustavo, who needs a kidney transplant. The Undocumented, …
How Democracy Works Now: Twelve Stories (2010) The documentary contains multiple, in-depth portraits that are weaved together to illustrate the full-blown social movement. It offers a window into the process of social change in a democracy, into the roots of immigration’s place in our culture and national identity and into the ability of the machinery …
