Motherhood across Borders: Immigrants and Their Children in Mexico and New York

Gabrielle Oliveira

Published by New York University Press 2018

Motherhood across Borders

Immigrants and Their Children in Mexico and New York

Gabrielle Oliveira

https://doi.org/10.18574/nyu/9781479801855.001.0001

Overview
Contents

About this book

Winner, 2019 Inaugural Outstanding Ethnography Book Award, given by the Ethnography in Education Research Forum

Winner, 2019 Outstanding Book Award, given by the Council on Anthropology and Education

The stories of Mexican migrant women who parent from afar, and how their transnational families stay together

While we have an incredible amount of statistical information about immigrants coming in and out of the United States, we know very little about how migrant families stay together and raise their children. Beyond the numbers, what are the everyday experiences of families with members on both sides of the border?

Focusing on Mexican women who migrate to New York City and leave children behind, Motherhood across Borders examines parenting from afar, as well as the ways in which separated siblings cope with different experiences across borders. Drawing on more than three years of ethnographic research, Gabrielle Oliveira offers a unique focus on the many consequences of maternal migration.

Oliveira illuminates the life trajectories of separated siblings, including their divergent educational paths, and the everyday struggles that undocumented mothers go through in order to figure out how to be a good parent to all of their children, no matter where they live. Despite these efforts, the book uncovers the far-reaching effects of maternal migration that influences both the children who accompany their mothers to New York City, and those who remain in Mexico.

With more mothers migrating without their children in search of jobs, opportunities, and the hope of creating a better life for their families, Motherhood across Borders is an invaluable resource for scholars, educators, and anyone with an interest in the current dynamics of U.S immigration.

Author / Editor information

Oliveira Gabrielle :

Gabrielle Oliveira is Assistant Professor at Boston College Lynch School of Education.

Reviews

Redolent with themes and experiences that are shared by millions of families around the globe. ... Blazes a pathway toward a richer understanding of how senses of belonging shift across the multiple affiliations maintained by these mobile populations: to their family networks, to their communities, and to more than one nation-state.

Alyshia Gálvez,Professor of Latin American and Latino Studies at Lehman College/CUNY:

"In this astute and sensitive ethnography, Oliveira does a remarkable job of capturing the poignant, mundane, tragic, and frustrating aspects of mothering from afar. The Mexican migrant women in her book spend their lives caring-- for children and other family members back home, family members in New York City, and often other peoples children, too--but all of their caring is not capable of fully bridging the distance or healing family ties broken by cruel immigration policies. If early studies of transnationalism made us optimistic that technology could link diasporic communities, this book reminds us that even in an era of Facetime and Facebook, migration involves separation. The difficult negotiations between mothers, other caregivers, and children, as well as between children (often siblings who have never met), are portrayed with compassion and sensitivity.

Deborah A. Boehm,author of Returned: Going and Coming in an Age of Deportation:
Motherhood across Borders is a vivid and engaging ethnography about how mothers, grandmothers, caregivers, and children fare when they are divided by, but also connected despite, the U.S.-Mexico border. Focusing on the voices of those directly impactedpeople of all ages, across generations, and in both Mexico and the United StatesOliveira provides an intimate portrayal of the ways that motherhood, and caregiving more generally, is shifting in transnational context.

CHOICE:
In five well-written, well-researched chapters, Oliveira focuses on the tensions and expectations immigrant mothers face, on the participation of these mothers in the education of their children in both Mexico and in the US, and on the ways children maintain bonds with mothers and siblings across two nations and cultures. She also notes the distinctive gender differences and educational achievements among these children. This book will be useful to anyone interested in the contours of transnational parenting in the 21st century.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Interlude 1. Parallel Lives Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	30
1. Ideals and Practices of Transnational Motherhood and Care Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	33
Interlude 2. When Caregivers and Mothers Don’t Get Along Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	59
2. Transnational Mothers and School- Related Decisions Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	68
Interlude 3. Drawings Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	92
3. Children and Youth’s Perspectives of the Other Side Ideas of Inequality and Sense of Belonging Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	98
Interlude 4. Giving Birth in New York City Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	122
4. Educational Aspirations and Social Trajectories of Separated Siblings Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	125
Interlude 5. Camila and Stella Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	157
5. For My Mother Gendered Education Experiences Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	162
Interlude 6. Letter to Carlitos Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	187
Conclusion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	189
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	203
Appendix A. Transnational Care Constellations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	207
Appendix B. Schooling Systems Here and There Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	211
Appendix C. Mexican Migration to the United States by State and Sex, 2010 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	213
Appendix D. Demographic Profile of Research Sites in New York City Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
Appendix E. A Note on Methods Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	217
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	223
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	235
About the Author Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	247

Language: English
Publisher: New York University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Illustrations
- Other: 14 black and white illustrations

eBook

Published: July 24, 2018
ISBN: 9781479801855