Building Walls

The election of Donald Trump has called attention to the border wall and anti-Mexican discourses and policies, yet these issues are not new. Building Walls puts the recent calls to build a border wall along the US-Mexico border into a larger social and historical context. This book describes the building of walls, symbolic and physical, between Americans and Mexicans, as well as the consequences that these walls have in the lives of immigrants and Latin communities in the United States. The book is divided into three parts: categorical thinking, anti-immigrant speech, and immigration as an experience. The sections discuss how the idea of the nation-state itself constructs borders, how political strategy and racist ideologies reinforce the idea of irreconcilable differences between whites and Latinos, and how immigrants and their families overcome their struggles to continue living in America. They analyze historical precedents, normative frameworks, divisive discourses, and contemporary daily interactions between whites and Latin individuals. It discusses the debates on how to name people of Latin American origin and the framing of immigrants as a threat and contrasts them to the experiences of migrants and border residents. Building Walls makes a theoretical contribution by showing how different dimensions work together to create durable inequalities between U.S. native whites, Latinos, and newcomers. It provides a sophisticated analysis and empirical description of racializing and exclusionary processes.View a separate blog for the book here: https://dornsife.usc.edu/csii/blog-building-walls-excluding-people/

Castan˜eda presents a conceptually thorough and theoretically comprehensive account for understanding the structural, discursive, and experiential conditions that racialize and demean the life and presence of Latin people in the United States. We not only observe his contribution to the sociological subject matter but also witness an exemplar of where migration studies stands today. By introducing a framework on Latin racialization and Pan-American racial projects, Castan˜eda takes critical immigration studies in the direction that is most needed to assess the political, demographic, and racial future of the United States., Buildings Wallsis likely to appeal to a wide audience because of its strong theoretical underpinnings, applied work on boundary-formation processes, and focus on a unique aspect of the Mexican-origin experience in the United States. These intersecting foci make the book an appropriate choice for advanced undergraduate or graduate courses in political sociology or in the sociology of immigration or courses focused on race and ethnicity in the U.S. context. Overall, Building Wallsis a thought-provoking book on an exigent topic, particularly given the rising anti-immigrant rhetoric and increasing hostility toward Mexican immigrants in the United States. While interaction and engagement may not be the ultimate solution, we have already witnessed the consequences of the status quo., In their work Building Walls: Excluding Latin People in the United States, Ernesto Castañeda and his coauthors explore the building of boundaries, both symbolic and physical, and the exclusion that these boundaries entail for Latin American and Caribbean populations in the United States. This comprehensive book offers an analysis on three levels. . . Castañeda and his coauthors put forward a wide range of evidence obtained through several methods, above all qualitative and mixed, to show the causes and consequences of the exclusion of Latin people. Their book is highly recommendable for students and experts in several disciplines—including sociology, international relations, and political science—who take an interest in the migratory issue and in the everyday racism, nationalism, and discrimination suffered by the population of Latin American origin in United States., Building Walls brings a much-needed critical race analysis to migration studies. Castañeda draws from a wide variety of sources and voices to paint a picture of the exclusion and racialization experienced by people with origins in Latin America who have made their homes in the United States. Expertly weaving in analyses of nationalism, border vigilantism, white supremacy, and immigration enforcement, Building Walls provides a clear and provocative analysis of our contemporary moment. This book would be an excellent addition to courses on race and migration across a wide variety of disciplines., Despite facing a harsh context of reception, evidence shows that most immigrants today are successfully incorporating into the U.S. Nevertheless, anti-immigrant, and specially, anti-Latino sentiments have seemingly intensified and may have contributed to Trump’s presidential victory. Why? This book explains it. Castañeda marshals compelling ethnographic, statistical, and historical evidence to show the roots and consequences of the exclusion of Latin people in the U.S. For those who care about the future of the country, Building Walls is a required text.

Ernesto Castañeda is assistant professor of sociology at American University where he is affiliated with the Metropolitan Policy Center, the Center of Latin American and Latino Studies, and the Center on Health Risk and Society.