Resources

“I also want to reject both the naïve proposition that we are prisoners of our past and the pernicious suggestion that history is whatever we make of it. History is the fruit of power, but power itself is never so transparent that its analysis becomes superfluous. The ultimate mark of power may be its invisibility: the ultimate challenge, the exposition of its roots.”~ Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Silencing the Past

There is much knowledge from and about borders and the borderlands out there. The following lists are just some suggestions from BSP staff for those who want to learn more about the histories, struggles and resistances of the peoples and lands that we inhabit. We do encourage you to go beyond the materials offered here. 

  • Suggested Non-fiction: Books, Films and Podcasts
  • Suggested Fiction: Books, Films and Podcasts
  • Reports
  • Books
    • Acuña, Rudolfo. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos. Addison, 4th Edition, 1999.• Anzaldúa. Gloria. Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. San Francisco: Spinsters/Aunt Lute, 1987.

    • Anzaldúa, Gloria, Cherríe Moraga and Toni Cade Bambara, eds. This Bridge Called My Back (4th ed). New York: State University of New York Press, 2015

    • Bobrow-Strain, Aaron. The Death and Life of Aida Hernandez: A Border Story. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019.

    • Chacón, Justin Akers and Mike Davis. No One is Illegal: Fighting Violence and State Repression on the US-Mexico Border. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2006.

    • De León, Jason. The Land of Open Graves: Living and Dying on the Migrant Trail. University of California Press, 2015.

    • Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne. An Indigenous People’s History of the United States. Boston: Beacon Press, 2014.

    • Dunn, Timothy J. The Militarization of the U.S.-Mexico Border, 1978-1992: Low-Intensity Conflict Doctrine Come Home. Center for Mexican American Studies, 1996.

    • Dwyer, Augusta. On the Line: Life on the U.S. Mexican Border. London: Latin American Bureau, 1994.

    • Hernández, Roberto. Coloniality of the US/Mexico Border: Power, Violence, and the Decolonial Imperative. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 2018

    • Hickey, Maeve and Lawrence Taylor. Ambos Nogales: Intimate Portraits on the U.S.-Mexico Border. Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, 2002.

    • Loyd, Jenna, Matt Mitchelson and Andrew Burridge, eds. Beyond Walls and Cages: Prisons, Borders, and Global Crisis. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2012.

    • Martinez, Oscar. Border People: Life and Society in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands. University of Arizona Press, 1994.

    • Miller, Todd. Build Bridges, Not Walls: A Journey to a World Without Borders. San Francisco: City Lights, 2021

    • Miller, Todd. Empire of Borders: The Expansion of the U.S. Border Around the World. Verso, 2019.

    • Miller, Todd. Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration, And Homeland Security. San Francisco: City Lights, 2017.

    • Miller, Todd. Border Patrol Nation: Dispatches from the Front Lines of Homeland Security. San Francisco: City Lights, 2014.

    • Nazario, Sonia. Enrique’s Journey. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007.

    • Nevins, Joseph. Dying to Live: A Story of U.S. Immigration in an Age of Global Apartheid. San Francisco: City Lights, 2008.

    • Nevins, Joseph. Operation Gatekeeper: The Rise of the Illegal Alien. Routledge, 2002.

    • Saldaña- Portillo, María Josefina. Indian Given: Racial Geographies across Mexico and the United States. Duke University Press, 2016.

    • Tzintzún, Cristina, Carlos Pérez de Alejo and Arnulfo Manríquez, eds. Presente! Voces de Inmigrantes Latin@s en la Lucha por la Justicia Racial. Oakland: AK Press, 2014.

    • Walia, Harshia. Undoing Border Imperialism. AK Press, 2013.

    • Washington, John. The Dispossessed: A Story of Asylum and the U.S.-Mexican Border and Beyond. Verso, 2020.

    Films/Documentaries

    Undeterred. Directed by Eva Lewis, 2018.

    Podcasts

    • Radiolab, Border Trilogy, New York Public Radio, 2018.

  • Books
    • Anaya, Rudolfo. Bless Me, Ultima. Berkley, CA: Tonatiuh-Quinto Sol Publishers, 1992.• Boyle, T. C. The Tortilla Curtain. Penguin Books, 1995.

    • Burciaga, José Antonio. Drink Cultura: Chicanismo. Santa Barbara: Joshua Odell Editions, 1993.

    • Burciaga, José Antonio. Spilling the Beans. Santa Barbara: Joshua Odell Editions, 1995.

    • Cantú, Norma Elia. Canícula: Snapshots of a Girlhood en la Frontera. Albuquerque, University of New Mexico Press, 1995.

    • Cisneros, Sandra. The House on Mango Street.New York: Random House, 1984

    • Fuentes, Carlos. The Crystal Frontier. Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1997.

    • Rechy, John. The Miraculous Day of Amalia Gomez. New York: Arcade Publishing, 1991.

    • Saenz, Benjamin Alire. Carry Me Like Water. Harper Perennial, 1995.

    • Sanchez, Ricardo. Canto y Grito–Mi Liberación: The Liberation of a Chicano Mind and Soul. Washington State UP, 1995.

    Films

    Sleep Dealer. Directed by Alex Rivera, Likely Story and That is That Productions, 2009

  • • Aizeki, M., G. Boyce, T. Miller and J. Nevins. 2021. “Smart Border or a Humane World?” New York: Open Society Foundation, Immigrant Defense Project, and the Transnational Institute

    • Andrade, M. and G. Boyce. 2021. “The Border’s Long Shadow: How Border Patrol Uses Racial Profiling and Local and State Police to Target and Instill Fear in Michigan’s Immigrant Communities.” Detroit, MI: American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan

    • Boyce, G. and S. Launius. 2019. “The Immigration Dragnet and the Dispossession of Household and Community Wealth in the United States.” Tucson, AZ: Binational Migration Institute, the University of Arizona

    • Boyce, G. and S. Launius. 2013. “Warehousing the Poor: How Federal Prosecution Initiatives like Operation Streamline Hurt Immigrants, Drive Mass Incarceration and Damage U.S. Communities” DifferenTakes 82 https://sites.hampshire.edu/popdev/warehousing-the-poor-how-federal-prosecution-initiatives-like-operation-streamline-hurt-immigrants-drive-mass-incarceration-and-damage-u-s-communities/

    • Martínez, D., R. Reineke, G. Boyce, S. N. Chambers, S. Launius, B. E. Anderson, G. L. Hess, J. M. Vollner, B. O. Parks, C. C. M. Vogelsberg, G. Soto, M. Kreyche, and R. Rubio-Goldsmith. 2021. “Migrant Deaths in Southern Arizona: Recovered Undocumented Border Crosser Remains Investigated by the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner, 1990 – 2020” Tucson, AZ: Binational Migration Institute, the University of Arizona

    • Miller, T. 2019. “More Than a Wall: Corporate Profiteering and the Militarization of U.S. Borders” Amsterdam: No More Deaths and Transnational Institute. https://www.tni.org/en/morethanawall

    • No More Deaths and Coalición de Derechos Humanos. 2017-2021. “Disappeared: How the U.S. Border Enforcement Agencies are Fueling a Missing Persons Crisis” Tucson, AZ: No More Deaths and Coalición de Derechos Humanos

    • People Helping People in the Border Zone. 2014. “Checkpoint Monitoring Report” Arivaca, AZ: People Helping People in the Border Zone http://phparivaca.org/?page_id=1174

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