Precarity and Belonging: Labor, Migration, and Noncitizenship

Catherine S. Ramírez

Published by Rutgers University Press 2021

Precarity and Belonging

Labor, Migration, and Noncitizenship

Catherine S. Ramírez
Edited by: Catherine S. Ramírez , Sylvanna M. Falcón , Juan Poblete , Steven C. McKay and Felicity Amaya Schaeffer

In the series Latinidad: Transnational Cultures in the

https://doi.org/10.36019/9781978815667

Overview
Contents

About this book

Precarity and Belonging examines how the movement of people and their incorporation, marginalization, and exclusion, under epochal conditions of labor and social precarity affecting both citizens and noncitizens, have challenged older notions of citizenship and alienage. This collection brings mobility, precarity, and citizenship together in order to explore the points of contact and friction, and, thus, the spaces for a possible politics of commonality between citizens and noncitizens.The editors ask: What does modern citizenship mean in a world of citizens, denizens, and noncitizens, such as undocumented migrants, guest workers, permanent residents, refugees, detainees, and stateless people? How is the concept of citizenship, based on assumptions of deservingness, legality, and productivity, challenged when people of various and competing statuses and differential citizenship practices interact with each other, revealing their co-constitutive connections? How is citizenship valued or revalued when labor and social precarity impact those who seemingly have formal rights and those who seemingly or effectively do not? This book interrogates such binaries as citizen/noncitizen, insider/outsider, entitled/unentitled, “legal”/“illegal,” and deserving/undeserving in order to explore the fluidity--that is, the dynamism and malleability--of the spectra of belonging.

Author / Editor information

CATHERINE S. RAMÍREZ is an associate professor of Latin American and Latino studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is the author of Assimilation: An Alternative History and The Woman in the Zoot Suit: Gender, Nationalism, and the Cultural Politics of Memory.

SYLVANNA M. FALCÓN is an associate professor of Latin American and Latino studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is the author of the award-winning book Power Interrupted: Antiracist and Feminist Activism inside the United Nations and co-editor of New Directions in Feminism and Human Rights.

JUAN POBLETE is a professor of literature at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the author of Hacia una historia de la lectura y la pedagogía literaria en América Latina and La Escritura de Pedro Lemebel and editor of New Approaches to Latin American Studies and Critical Latin American and Latino Studies.

STEVEN C. McKAY is an associate professor of sociology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the author of Satanic Mills or Silicon Islands? The Politics of High-Tech Production in the Philippines and co-editor of New Routes for Diaspora Studies.

FELICITY AMAYA SCHAEFFER is an associate professor of feminist studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is the author of Love and Empire: Cybermarriage and Citizenship across the Americas.

Reviews

"Precarity and Belonging is a marvelous and timely collection. The essays brilliantly explore how the increasing precarization of life impacts the social and physical mobility of both citizens and noncitizens, blurring the boundaries between them and thus making possible a politics of commonality."

— Jonathan Xavier Inda, author of Targeting Immigrants: Government, Technology, and Ethics

"This judiciously selected compilation shines by threading the critical link of insecurity through spaces of belonging, labor, and migration across time and contexts. Through the lens of precarity, the insightful, accessible, brilliant essays in this collection expose the complexity and fragility of life at the heart of our troubled times. It breaks new ground and will be read widely."

— Cecilia Menjívar, co-editor of The Oxford Handbook of Migration Crises

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction: Toward a Politics of Commonality: The Nexus of Mobility, Precarity, and (Non)citizenship Catherine S. Ramírez, Juan Poblete, Sylvanna M. Falcón, Steven C. Mckay and Felicity Amaya Schaeffer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I Mobility and Migration
1 More Equal Than Others: Managing the Boundaries of Citizenship Bridget Anderson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	19
2 Refractions of the Nation: The Democratic Impacts of “Chain Migration” Adrián Félix Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	32
3 Racialization of Central Americans in the United States Leisy J. Abrego and Alejandro Villalpando Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	51
4 The Waste of Globalization’s Party Alejandro Grimson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	67
5 Occupation on Sacred Land: Colliding Mobilities on the Tohono O’odham Reservation Felicity Amaya Schaeffer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	84
6 A State-to- Come: Tibetan Refugee-Citizenship and the Nation in Exile Tsering Wangmo Dhompa Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	100
Part II Labor and Precarity
7 Apartheid, Migrant Labor, and Precarity in Comparative Perspective Marcel Paret Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	113
8 Labor Precarity, Immigration, and the Challenges of Accessing Worker Rights: Evidence from California Shannon Gleeson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	131
9 Negotiating Indenture: Migrant Domestic Work and Temporary Labor Migration in Singapore Rhacel Salazar Parreñas Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	145
10 Pocketed Proletarianization: Why There Is No Labor Politics in the “World’s Factory” Biao Xiang Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	161
11 The Urban Exclusion of Internally Displaced Farmers in Medellín, Colombia Claudia Maria López Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	176
Part III Belonging and (Non)citizenship
12 Exclusionary Inclusion: Applying for Legal Status in the United States Susan Bibler Coutin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
13 Formal and Informal Citizenships: The Spectrum of Practices and Statuses in Latin America and the United States Juan Poblete Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	209
14 Denizenship Nicholas De Genova Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	227
15 Black No More: Black Denizenship and the Struggle for the Future Catherine S. Ramírez Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	243
16 Imperial Citizenship: Marshall Islanders and the Compact of Free Association Emily Mitchell-Eaton Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	256
Afterword: The Politics of Precarity and Noncitizenship under Global Capitalism Tanya Golash-Boza Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	266
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	275
Notes on Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	277
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	281