2020-21 Abstract:

Enduring Immigrant “Illegality” in Mexico:  Waiting, Aging, and the State

Angela Garcia is exploring the wide-ranging effects of long-term separation on aging parents left behind in Mexico by their adult children who have permanently settled without authorized immigration status in the US. Undocumented Mexican immigrants who leave the US face great risk and potential death if they attempt re-cross the southern border clandestinely, often making travel to visit or even to say good-bye to aging or dying parents prohibitive. Angela Garcia’s current project will analyze how the parents of undocumented Mexican immigrants practically deal with the constraints of legal status, family separation, and waiting as they navigate their relationship with the state. She will draw on interviews, ethnographic observations, and administrative data collected in Mexico to examine the effects of “enduring illegality” in relation to theories of time and state power, including the ways transnational families navigate state control. 

Biography:

Angela S. García is a sociologist and Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration. Her research centers on international migration, law and society, social policy, and well-being. García’s book, Legal Passing: Navigating Undocumented Life and Local Immigration Law (University of California Press 2019) compares the effects of restrictive and accommodating state and local-level immigration laws on the everyday lives of undocumented Mexican immigrants in the US. Her current book project theorizes time and waiting from the perspective of undocumented immigrants who would have been eligible for Deferred Action for the Parents of Americans (DAPA) and their aging parents left behind in communities of origin across Mexico. She is also developing a collaborative project on Chicago’s municipal ID program, the first to unfold under the Trump administration. García received her PhD in Sociology and her master’s in Latin American Studies from the University of California, San Diego.