This course broadly explores how the Central American diaspora has emerged in the United States and contemporary issues that shape the social, political, and cultural lives of this largely migrant and racialized population. Key questions we will address include:
Why are Central Americans in the United States?
How are they positioned within racial, political, and cultural landscapes in the United States?
What do their struggles for justice tell us about immigration enforcement, labor, identity formation, ethnic solidarity, and resistance?
The course is structured around four interconnected units that move forward chronologically and geographically moving through the past, present, and future and from Central America to the United States and utopias "not yet here." Each unit is grounded in a guiding question that will shape our reading and analysis.
Why do Central Americans leave to the United States?
We begin in Central America by exploring the historical, political, and economic conditions that have established immigration from the isthmus to the United States. In particular, we highlight how U.S. imperialism in the 19th, 20th, and 21st century unwillingly displaces Central Americans from their homes. Our goal is to demonstrate that immigration does not just happen but rather is the product of a long history of economic and political interests.
What happens when Central Americans arrive to the United States?
We continue our exploration by examining what Central Americans have to confront if and when they make it to the United States. Many Central Americans migrate in the hopes of finding better lives with more financial stability and less violence. However, in the United States, they are racialized as threats. This unit explores how their depictions as threats create perpetual legal, economic, and social threats for Central Americans as they endure xenophobia, labor exploitation, and family separations that perpetuate the precarity they were hoping to escape.
What kind of life do Central Americans imagine and fight for?
We end by examining the various ways in which Central Americans contest their disenfranchisement and in doing so imagine different ways of being. The prior unit focused on how Central Americans are perceived by others while this unit examines how Central Americans perceive themselves and try to reimagine an unjust world through poetry, art, testimonies, oral histories, and social justice movements.
How can we contribute and honor these pasts, presents, and futures?
Keeping in mind the prior units, we ask you to think of your project as a grain of sand or an offering to a larger vision of world-making that seeks to challenge the violence and fear imposed on Central Americans and other marginalized communities. At the end of the course, we will share these projects with community partners and upload them to the "Student Project Repository" tab of this webpage to similarly inspire others to engage with the themes and experiences highlighted in this course.
This course will prepare students to:
Critically interrogate mainstream depictions of Central Americans in the United States by locating these representations within relevant historical contexts, social structures, and political systems through written course assignments.
Conceptualize and complete self-directed projects by developing action plans with concrete deliverables and progressively working towards a final product.
Foster relationships with community partners and work collaboratively with peers by preparing for interpersonal and logistical challenges through group agreements, self-assessments, and transparent communication.
Embrace creativity and take risks by exploring multiple modes of expression outside of traditional academic writing to demonstrate their knowledge and application of course content.
These are some of the texts we will be engaging with throughout the semester.