MOVEMENT & MOVEMENTS: A POLITICAL ECONOMY OF

MIGRATION SEMINAR
~Earlham College Border Studies Program, Spring 2019~

The Law Locks up the Man or Woman

Who Steals the Goose from off the Common
But Lets the Greater Villain Loose
Who Steals the Common from the Goose
-traditional English poem, author unknown

THE BASICS

Instructor: Geoff Boyce

Email: geoff1boyce3@gmail.com
Time: Wednesdays, 3:00 – 4:30pm; Thursdays, 1:00 – 2:30pm
Location: Border Studies Aula
Office Hours: Mondays 1:00 – 2:00pm, Thursdays, 12:00 – 1:00pm

COURSE OVERVIEW

Summary:
This course is designed to provide robust insight into the global political and economic trends that
drive and condition patterns of transnational migration in North America; to place current trends in
historical and geographic context; to analyze the stakes and consequences of these phenomena; and to
consider a variety of alternatives/solutions proposed by distinct sectors of society in Mexico and the
United States. The class is structured as a regular weekly seminar. Reading assignments will be
designed to complement and provide background and context for the people, places and topics
approached throughout the BSP semester. Students will be expected to complete weekly reading

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assignments and to come to class prepared to ask critical questions and help facilitate group
discussion.

Focus:
Migration is a complex, multifaceted topic with extensive literature addressing its causes, forms,
history, direction, and consequences. Due to the complexity of migration and its intersections with
topics like race, identity, poverty, development, borders and militarism, this course cannot pretend to
be comprehensive. Rather, we will principally aim to situate contemporary international migration
trends involving Mexico, Central America and the United States in historical and geographic context,
and develop tools to analyze, understand and critically engage with these topics while in Tucson and
beyond.

Progression and Learning Goals:

The course explores human migration through (1) the political, economic and historical processes that
drive and condition contemporary patterns of human migration (2) the political and geographic
structures that categorize and define distinct persons and migration practices (3) the evolution of
international boundaries as tools for managing the flow and status of people and things (4) the
connections between constructions of citizenship, national identity, racism, militarism and
criminalization, and (5) the changes being wrought by the above on heterogeneous communities
across North America. Throughout the course we will examine (6) historical and contemporary social
movements that articulate with topics 1-5, above, and in the final weeks of the course we will (7) draw
from a semester of learning to consider the forms of resistance and alternatives to contemporary
migration and development regimes proposed by civil society actors in Mexico, Central America and
the United States. These final weeks will help course participants address the following questions as
they move forward upon completion of the program:

-What is your positionality in relation to these complex issues, and does this positionality shape the
understanding and commitments you will carry with you after you leave the Border Studies
Program?

-How do you approach forming an analysis of the socio-political problems that weave together the
borderlands and our home communities?

-What ideas, experiences, dreams and desires inform your perspective on immigration, borders,
social movements and political economy?

-What strategies and approaches might you adopt, individually and collectively, to change the
conditions of our lives, communities, and our world?

Participants who complete this course will be able to articulate the economic and political structures
in recent history and the present that create the conditions for migration, particularly instances of
unauthorized migration from Central American and Mexico to the United States. They will understand
the historical forces fomenting the construction of international boundaries and the ongoing
militarization of these liminal spaces between nations. Participants will be able to intellectually
connect the criminalization of migration to larger processes of exclusion that define the political,
social, and economic fabric of the United States, the Americas, and an increasingly polarized world.
They will be able to identify the mechanisms that reproduce this state of affairs. Participants will be
able to make a measured analysis of immigration-related socio-political conflicts here in the
borderlands and also in their home communities, and to decide on a course of action to address these
conditions as an outcome of their learning

***Finally, participants will demonstrate that they are able to move beyond intellectual relativism and
its evil twin, a hyper-cynical critique of everything, toward informed and nuanced political and
intellectual commitments related to key issues explored in this course.

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The Daily Workings of the Course:
This course emphasizes reading and discussion. Each week there will be substantial readings by
various authors, some of which are difficult. Each of us brings a unique life experience and different
academic training to the classroom, which means there will be much to learn not only from the
readings, but also from each other. Therefore, our goal in every class will be to create a healthy,
positive and constructive space for each individual to learn and grow, whether we agree or not.
Students are expected to contribute each week and to proactively seek the perspective of their peers.
Each class will be a collective effort to help each other understand the readings and how they apply to
the world and to our own lives. In this regard, we each have a responsibility to read carefully, share
insights, ask questions, and listen respectfully to each other. This does not mean that we will all agree,
and every disagreement or challenge will be an opportunity to fine-tune our analysis and
understanding. It does mean that we will strive to uncover the learning opportunity in every reading,
comment, or question.

Travel Seminar & Excursions:

Spending time in borderlands communities and in southern Mexico will allow participants to garner a
much richer, more personal, and deeper understanding of the course material than they would
otherwise. During the travel seminar and excursions, the nature of the course will change substantially
due to travel, meetings, and other activities. In short, these excursions are the experiential component
of the course, and present a critical learning opportunity vis-à-vis the semester overall. You will be
expected to engage with people and places on personal and intellectual levels. Your participation and
efforts at making sense of the various issues encountered during the travel seminar will count toward
your overall grades in this course.

Expectations:
Ultimately, participants are responsible for their own learning. The instructor is always available to
meet with participants to discuss questions or if they are struggling with the course. Always bring your
questions to class for discussion. If they are not satisfactorily addressed, schedule a meeting with your
instructor to discuss the question further. You will be expected to have finished all of the required
readings for each class and be prepared to discuss them.

Assessment:
In assessing students’ written and oral work for this course, I will make judgments about where it falls
in the trajectory of learning. I will focus on students’ efforts to engage the various texts and arguments
as well as the results of their engagement.
 Does the student demonstrate a solid grasp on the basic arguments in course materials?
 Does the student relate these arguments to other texts or topics in the course and program?
 Is the student able to relate the course content to their own lived experiences?
 Is the student willing to constructively engage arguments that they may not agree with?
 Does the student integrate new learnings into a practice of forming and sharing original
analysis with their peers?

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

(1) Reflection papers: Throughout the semester students will submit a total of three short
reflection papers. These papers are intended to summarize key ideas and learning across assigned
readings between multiple classes, and to encourage students to undertake synthesis and and analysis
of this content. Each reflection paper should be between 1,500 – 2,000 words in length. In your
reflection paper you should select at least one assigned reading from Geoff’s class and one assigned
reading from Mari’s class for each of the previous three weeks, and discuss key concepts and ideas
you’ve taken away from each reading. When possible, you should include reference to a page number
for any quote, concept or idea that you choose to discuss. Your reflection paper is an appropriate

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place to raise questions and to work through ideas – it is okay if something is not entirely clear to you,
or if you find something objectionable or underdeveloped or problematic. But you need to explain
why. In the process, you are also encouraged to compare arguments and ideas between texts, and to
identify how these may be in tension with one another, or else how any one text has helped to clarify
something for you that you struggled with in another text, or in a class discussion, etc. Finally,
students are encouraged to make connections to your personal life, to other classes in the BSP
semester, or to experiences you’ve encountered and reflected on during your field study, at your
homestay, or during a travel seminar or excursion. (30%)

(2) Seminar Facilitation: Students will each be paired up in groups of two or three and expected to
co-facilitate conversation for at least one class period during the semester. Facilitators should come to
class prepared to summarize key concepts, ideas or arguments that they took from the readings
assigned for that week. Facilitators should each prepare at least three questions about each assigned
reading designed to stimulate group conversation. Questions should be probing rather than factual –
this is to say, designed to generate debate, reflection or clarification of a particular concept, argument
or theory. Facilitators might also present biographical information about an author or factual
information about a text to contextualize these for their peers. Other group exercises are encouraged,
including group mapping of timelines, key words and vocabulary, etc. (20%)

(3) Book Presentation: In small groups or as individuals, course participants will read a book that
discusses and dissects contemporary events in Mexico, the borderlands, or narratives of migration
that tie together lives and communities in Central America, Mexico and the United States.

Book Ideas for Review Assignment:

1. Joseph Nevins & Mizue Aizeki. Dying to Live: A Story of US Immigration in an Age of Global
Apartheid. San Francisco: City Lights, 2008.
2. David Bacon. The Children of NAFTA: Labor Wars on the US-Mexico Border University of
California Press, 2004.
3. John Gibler. To Die in Mexico: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Drug War San
Francisco: City Lights, 2011.
4. Óscar Martínez. The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging the Narcos on the Migrant Trail.
Verso 2013.
5. Miriam Davidson. Lives on the Line: Dispatches from the U.S.-Mexico Border. University of
Arizona Press, 2000.
6. Anabel Hernández. NarcoLand: The Mexican Drug Lords and Their Godfathers Verso, 2014.
7. Kelly Lytle Hernández. Migra!: A History of the U.S. Border Patrol. University of California
Press, 2010.
8. Luis Alberto Urrea. The Devil’s Highway: A True Story BayBack Books, 2004.
9. Aaron Bobrow Strain. The Death and Life of Aida Hernandez Farar, Straus and Giroux, 2019.
10. Dawn Paley. Drug War Capitalism AK Press. 2014.
11. Harsha Walia. Undoing Border Imperialism AK Press. 2013.

During the week of March 24-29, participants, individually or in small groups, will give 15-minute
presentations on the book. Drawing from our experiences and studies, and comparing various
elements of the books, we will be able to draw new lessons from these narratives. (15%)

(4) Semester Project & Presentation: As an individual or in a group, students will create
materials and/or resources to use for advancing awareness or organizing efforts among groups you
engage with in your home communities. This project offers participants the opportunity to delve
deeper into a topic of personal interest and put together what they are learning from course readings
discussed in class with firsthand experiences garnered throughout the semester. Whatever topic and
medium is chosen, it must be approved by your instructor. You should be thinking about potential
projects from the beginning of the semester and be prepared to begin working on them by the
beginning of October (Week 5). Your final project for the Movement and Movements seminar will

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also overlap with and contribute toward your grade in [Mari’s seminar]. Please consult instructors for
further guidance.
Proposed project must be approved by Friday, March 1.
Option 1: Podcast – plan and execute a podcast of at least 20 minutes
Option2: Zine –design and create an alternative zine of a minimum of 10 pages
Option 3: Workshop – design and plan a minimum 3-hour workshop
Option 4: Video – plan and film a minimum 15 minutes of video
Project presentations in class Wednesday May 1 ***unless we decide as a class to move the date
Final submission due Thursday May 2 . (20%)

(5) Attendance, Participation: All students must attend class, arrive on time, and be prepared to
actively/constructively participate in class discussions.
*Participation in meetings and discussions during excursions and the travel seminar will also be
evaluated in your participation grade.
**Participation in class is about much more than speaking or listening in class. It is also about
contributing to the creation of a positive learning environment for everyone. Your ability and efforts to
contribute to a positive classroom environment will be evaluated in your participation grade. (15%)

LATE WORK: Late work will be reduced by 1/3 grade per day late. If extension is given, and the
work is still late, then the grade will be reduced by 1 letter grade each day thereafter.

COURSE SCHEDULE

*The course syllabus, including readings and schedule, is subject to changes during the semester.
Please note that readings are usually listed in the order they are intended to be read. When
possible I give you the entire chapter even if we’re only reading parts of it. That way you can read
it entirely if you want or to save it for the future.

WEEK ONE
January 28 – February 1: Situating Ourselves and Getting Started
Required readings:
1. Course Syllabus
2. Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States, Chapter 1
“Follow the Corn” pp. 15-31
3. Patrick Wolfe “Settler Colonialism and the Elimination of the Native” Journal of Genocide
Research
Excursion: Nogales

WEEK TWO
February 4 – 8: Capitalism, An Origin Story
Required Readings:
1. Silvia Federici, chapter 2 in Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive
Accumulation, pp. 61-132
2. Sarah Launius and Geoffrey Alan Boyce “More than Metaphor: Settler Colonialism, Forced
Displacement and Gentrification in a Southwestern US City”
Excursion: Barrio Walk

WEEK THREE
February 11 – 15: Labor, Race and Class in the United States
1. Joel Olson, The Abolition of White Democracy chapter 2: “The Problem of the White Citizen”
pp. 31-64
2. James Baldwin “On Being White and Other Lies”

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 3. Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States: From the 1960s to
the 1990s chapter 4 “Racial Formation” pp. 53-7
Excursion: Border Patrol and Arivaca
First Reflection Paper Due February 14

WEEK FOUR
February 18 – 22: The Politics of Time
1. Doreen Massey, part one “Setting the Scene” For Space, pp. 1-8.
2. Anibal Quijano, “Coloniality of Power, Eurocentrism, and Latin America”
3. Andre Gunter-Frank, “The Development of Underdevelopment”
No excursion - ***no class Thursday 2/21 - Rodeo Break***

WEEK FIVE
February 25 – March 1: Neoliberalism in MesoAmerica
Required Video:
1. What is Neoliberalism? http://sfonline.barnard.edu/gender-justice-and-neoliberal-
transformations/what-is-neoliberalism/
1. “The Shock Doctrine” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3B5qt6gsxY&t=9s (118 minutes)
Required Readings:
1. David Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, Chapters 1 and 6, “Freedom’s Just Another
Word…,” “Dispatches from the Frontlines”
2. Jeremy Gilbert, “’Neoliberalism’ and ‘Capitalism’ – What’s the Difference?,”
JeremyGilbertWriting Blog, July, 14, 2015.
3. Jerome Roos, “Since the Mexican Debt Crisis: 30 Years of Neoliberalism” in Roarmag.org,
August 22, 2012.
4. Manuel Perez-Rocha and Julia Paley, “What ‘Free Trade’ Has Done to Central America” in
Foreign Policy in Focus, November 21, 2014
Excursion: Operation Streamline ***no class Thursday 2/28 for Operation Streamline***
Final project proposals due March 1

WEEK SIX
March 4 – 8: Neoliberalism and the Carceral State
Required Video:
1. Black Power Mixtape https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bryh0IFMhg&t=3547s
Required Readings:
1. Jordan Camp, introduction and chapter 2 and 3 in Incarcerating the Crisis: Freedom
Struggles and the Rise of the Neoliberal State
2. “People with Felonies, Criminal Records and Gang Affiliation Are Our Friends and Family”
Excursion: El Paso ***Wednesday 3/6 class at 10am - no class Thursday 3/7 for El Paso***
Second reflection paper due March 7

WEEK SEVEN
March 11 – 15: Unpacking Border Imperialism
Required Readings:
1. Harsha Walia, Undoing Border Imperialism, Chapter 1 “What is Border Imperialism?” pp. 37-
78.
2. Todd Miller, “The Border Patrol’s New Hire,” Aljazeera America, October 4, 2014.
3. Murphy Woodhouse, “Reluctant Migration: The Vicious Cycle of Debt, Deportation and
Flawed Policy That Drives Central Americans Over the Border Again and Again” in Truthout
4. Diego Cupolo “We Reap What We Sow: The Link Between Child Migrants and US Policy”
in Upside Down World August 1, 2014
No Excursion

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 WEEK EIGHT
March 18 – 22: ***Spring Break - NO CLASS ***

WEEK NINE
March 25 – 29: Book Presentations
**No Required Readings – No Seminar Facilitation**
In-Class Book Presentations Due
Excursion: Florence

WEEK TEN
April 1 -5: ***AAG - Geoff is gone - NO CLASS ***
Excursion: Sells and Ajo

WEEK ELEVEN
April 8 – 12: Neoliberalism: Alternatives and Resistance in Mexico
Required Video: The Demarest Factor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIb3cJJdVYQ
Required Readings:
1. John Gibler, Mexico Unconquered: Chronicles of Power and Revolt Chapter 5 “The Oaxaca
Uprising” pp. 139-188
2. Gustavo Esteva and Madhu Suri Prakash Grassroots Postmodernism: Remaking the Soil of
Cultures Chapter 4 “Human Rights: The Trojan Horse of Recolonization?”
3. Alvaro Reyes “Zapatismo: Other Geographies Circa ‘the End of the World’” in Environment
and Planning D: Society and Space

WEEK TWELVE
April 15 – 19: Charting Abolitionist Futures
Required Readings:
1. Grace Lee Boggs The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First
Century Chapter 1 “These are the Times to Grow Our Souls” pp. 28-51
2. Jenna Loyd “Live, Love and Work: An Interview with Luis Fernandez, August 2010” in Beyond
Walls and Cages: Prisons, Borders, and Global Crisis pp. 228-240
3. Stevie Peace, “The Desire to Heal: Harm Intervention in a Landscape of Restorative Justice
and Critical Resistance” in Uses of a Whirlwind: Movement, Movements, and Contemporary
Radical Currents in the United States AK Press
4. Chris Carlsson, “Radical Patience: Feeling Effective over the Long Haul” in Team Colors
Collective (eds.) Uses of a Whirlwind: Movement, Movements, and Contemporary Radical
Currents in the United States Oakland: AK Press
Excursion: Oaxaca
Third Reflection Paper Due April 18

WEEK THIRTEEN
April 22 – 26: ***Oaxaca Trip – No Class***

WEEK FOURTEEN
April 29 – May 3: – Conclusion
**No Required Readings – No Seminar Facilitation**
Semester Project Presentations