Class Year

2019

Document Type

Student Research Paper

Date of Creation

Fall 2019

Department 1

Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies

Abstract

The US-Mexico border has been increasing its security measures, which has corresponded with increases in migration. Due to increasing restrictions on who is able to legally migrate, many turn to irregular migration, and the more effective way of achieving irregular migration is through use of a migrant facilitator. Migrant smugglers are individuals who receive compensated for assisting others in crossing a national border through illegal means. In discourses about irregular migration from the media and political, migrant smugglers are typically portrayed as criminalized men who take advantage of vulnerable, victimized women migrants. While the experiences of men and women migrants and migrant facilitators may be highly gender-based and are often fraught with dangers, this conflated view of the migrant smuggling process reproduces dominant narratives of xenophobia and anti-immigration sentiment.

Comments

Student research paper written for WGS 225: Gender & Global Migration.

Share

COinS