Photo from The Undocumented Migration Project website |
I finished The Land of Open Graves: Living and Dying on the Migrant Trail. It was a gift from my friend Carolina, creator of My (un)Documented Life blog. It was written by Jason De Leόn, an anthropologist of Mexican descent, who spent 5 years in the field, in his journey to complete this project. At its heart, his work depicts the violence faced by border crossers “as they attempt to enter the US without authorization by walking across the vast Sonoran desert of Arizona”. Its focus is on the Prevention through Deterrence (PTD) policy enacted in 1993.
The author
explained that when the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was passed
in 1994, the U.S. promised economic prosperity for Mexico if it would open up
its ports of entry for inexpensive goods. Shortly thereafter, Mexico was
abundant with U.S. subsidized corn that put millions of Mexican farmers out of
work
Google gave
me some background on NAFTA. Its purpose was to expand
the flow of goods between Canada, US and Mexico. It eliminated import tariffs
and eliminated or reduced non-tariff trade barriers like import quotas,
licensing schemes and technical barriers to change. Lastly, it created
protections for intellectual property.
I harken
back to my reading of In our Image by Stanley Karnow. In the late 1800s, William Taft advocated for lower
tariffs for Philippine sugar, hemp, tobacco and coconut oil. In exchange,
duties were imposed on non US products going into the Philippines, so they were
more expensive than US products. These decisions during the long term
relationship between the US and the Philippines, created the economic landscape.
I understood my family’s migration. I appreciated how Mr. De Leόn created the
backdrop between US and Mexico. I am
reminded that people wouldn’t risk such a journey if there were other economic
options.
I learned
too with NAFTA that Mexico’s wages increased 2.3% between 1994 and 2012. Unemployment rates were high. Between 1991
and 2007, almost 2 million jobs were lost in the agriculture industry. Also in
that time period, the price of tortillas, a staple in Mexican increased 279%.
Coupled with the falling price of corn paid to Mexican farmers, it was a blow
to the Mexican economy. The displacement of farmers created a surge in Mexican
emigration to the U.S. Upon arriving, they lived incognito and competed for low
wage jobs.
I learned
approximately 11.7 million people were apprehended by the US border patrol in
the Tucson area. It is “a craggy, depopulated and mountainous patch” from New
Mexico to Arizona, south of Tucson between the Baboquivaro and Tumacácori mountains. The border patrol
counts on the terrain. It’s the agency’s not-so-secret weapon in moving more
border patrol to populated cities so migrants have to cross in depopulated
areas.
The PTD
strategy was and is effective. Death was the unintended consequence but the
Government accountability office (GAO) identified death as a measurement of
PTD’s success.
Mr. De León initiated the Undocumented Migration Project (UMP) in 2009 with a goal that
anthropology and its 4 fields: ethnography, archeology,
forensic science and linguistics
could be used to understand migration and the economics behind it. He thought
in humanizing the undocumented masses, serious conversations about America’s
broken immigration system could take place.
The author
refers to the “hybrid collectif”, which are actants that create a hybrid system
that is equal parts human, plant, object and geography. This complex
relationship, at different moments in time and space, creates a wall of
deterrence. The border patrol has used the PTD to do the dirty work while
absolving itself of blame connected with migrant death or injury. The author
calls it a “moral alibi”.
The author
then talks about necroviolence, hostility towards the dead that humans have perpetuated
for a millennia. He gave examples of Achilles dragging Hector’s body
around Troy, the Aztec’s mounting the heads of conquistadors and their horses
on Tzumpantilli as a message to Cortez to evacuate Tenochtitlan and the
Catholics feeding bodies of Protestants to crows and dogs during the French
Wars. Such acts were “glories” to the perpetrators because torture extended
beyond the moment of death.
While in
the field, the author experimented with the bodies of pigs. He paid for 5 of
them to be shot. Each was dressed in clothing typically worn my migrants. Each
body was then placed in different contexts (sunlight v. shade) while the author
and his team could observe the rapid decomposition of the body in the desert.
After the
pigs were killed, they were dressed in clothing one might expect on a migrant.
“Someone put a wallet in each of the pockets along with other personal effects,
including several coins and slip of paper with a phone number written on it. A
black backpack with a bottle of water are placed next to the body”.
After 120
hours turkey vultures are attracted by the stench. They feasted. In about 6
hours the bones are de-fleshed. By day 3, the pig body is a shell of what it
used to be. The clothes were torn. The shoes and pants were nowhere to be seen.
Maggots worked on the remaining tissue between the vertebrae. When he body was
light enough, the birds picked up and moved it around to access whatever meat
was left. Skeletal elements and personal effects were recovered over 50 meters
from the original location. The turkey vultures fed on what remained. The
experiment stopped after 14 days. The author and his team collected what bones
they could find.
Photo from The Undocumented Migration Project |
The
mutilation and eventual erasure of bodies in the dessert as a result of PTD is
intended to send a message to others who consider the journey. At times the author wondered about the act of
using pigs in migrant clothes for his work. The animals served their purpose of
showing him, his audience, us, that the terrain traversed by migrants was
chosen with the intent of their demise. It is a warning against other crossers
that they should not enter our borders. Death awaits them. Horrors will come to pass beyond death. Given
the amount of bodies recovered in Arizona and the technology used by border
patrol (drones, night vision goggles) “suggests that a war on non-citizens is
in fact taking place on US soil”.
My Google search on ethnography has informed me that ethnographers observing a culture, within the setting as both participant and observer form lasting bonds with the people they observe.
The latter
half of this book is about the author's contact with two gentlemen, Memo and Lucho that were aids
at a migrant station. They were also border crossers. He refers to them as his
friends and his brothers. He writes of their time helping other migrants, their
own preparations for their crossing and what their lives were like after the
journey. Never mind the near death experience of traversing the dessert. Their
lives in the US had also taken its toll. With the author's background and intimacy with the language, he talks of their individual hardships, detectable within the dialogue.
The author
then talks about finding Maricela. Maricela, who loved to sing and dance, had a
husband and children. She crossed having seen what her brother in law was able
to provide his family through remittances. She wanted the same for her
children.
She was
found lying face down in the dirt. She wore generic white and brown running
shoes, black leggings and a long sleeved camouflage shirt. She collapsed mid
hike. Her fingers had curled with rigor mortis. Her pants were stained with
excrement and were bubbling with copper colored fluids expelled from her body
upon death. When her body was loaded onto a plane, she became a documented
Ecuadorian citizen with rights and privileges. Never mind that she had no face
and hands. The author explained to her family that the authorities probably
needed her finger prints. Her hands had stiffened with rigor mortis. “The
fingers curl and they had to soak the skin to get the finger prints”. Mr. De
Leόn told her family that animals had not mutilated her. Maricela was one of the exceptions since her
family had the opportunity to bury her.
Photo by Michael Wells |
This book
was a difficult read. I am reminded of my privilege. My journey to America was
via airplane. We had meals and a suitcase of personal items. When we arrived in
the spring, our family had coats for us. My migration had its trauma but none
of it reduced us to bare life, the way the nameless undocumented endure. The
author has focused on the PTD policy but there are so many systems at play that
would have the U.S. government enact such a strategy. It is evident that the economic data is a
priority.
I am
grateful of the author’s reminder that the lives taken by the dessert are not statistics.
They are individuals that just like Maricela deserve the rights and privileges
afforded to any human.
I made contact with the author. He was kind enough to provide the image of the pigs (photo courtesy of the Undocumented Migration Project) and Maricela (photo by Michael Wells).
Thank you for the thoughtful in-depth review. I shared in on FB in my modest attempt to spread empathy for immigrants. My respect for the author is tempered by his lack of empathy for animals, however. The pigs he shot were sentient beings who had a right as people do to live their lives in the pig-like pursuit of happiness and not be shot for someone's project, no matter how worthy. Regardless, I am grateful that this project was brought o my attention by you. I wish more people would have empahty for those who struggle to reach the US, rather than demonizing and marginalizing them.
ReplyDeleteI promise the author also struggled with the killing of the pigs.
ReplyDelete