Ethnographies of Transnational Migration in Ruben Martinez's Crossing Over

Abstract

border is a marketplace. The invisible hand of powerful governs crossings. --Amitava Kumar, Passport Photos (219) The emphasis on binational and transnational relations in Studies in last two decades (1) has coincided with important thematic changes in post-movement (2) literature by US writers of Mexican origin. In 1990s and 2000s, autobiographical works by Juan Felipe Herrera, Michele Serros, and Norma E. Cantu, journalistic chronicles (3) of Ruben Martinez and Luis Alberto Urrea, fiction of Sandra Cisneros, Paul S. Flores, Alicia Gaspar de Alba, and Demetria Martinez, as well as performances of Guillermo Gomez-Pena have exposed instances of uprooting, intercultural contact, violence, and exploitation in a wide context of trans-American relations. (4) Many of these writers continue to claim label Chicano for themselves as a sign of intellectual commitment to struggle for social justice of citizens and non-citizens of Mexican origin. However, for these or Chicana authors, relationship between US and Mexico, between US and Latin America, is not only part of past, but also part of present and most immediate future of Latinos in United States. These writers' experiences of physical and cultural mobility as Chicanos and Chicanas certainly constitute a springboard to understand other instances of dislocation that may not be identical to their own, but that are equally rooted in power imbalances between First and Third World. We may say, therefore, that these authors partake of a consciousness, if, following theoretical work of James Clifford and Stuart Hall, refers to voluntary and involuntary migrations and movements resulting from shifting power structures and to new subjectivities and cultural practices within multiple forms of global mobility. Initially, one feels reluctant to apply concept of diaspora to a Mexican American experience such as one narrated in Ruben Martinez's chronicle Crossing Over. Transnational Mexican workers have not definitely abandoned their land, nor is this land distant and remote as term implies. Since seasonal work causes migrant workers to go back and forth from one country to another, they do return to Mexico, although often not at their own will. Thus, when we apply notion of diaspora to these migrants' constant contact with place of origin, we are doing it in a new sense that differs from one often assigned to Jewish or African diasporas. (5) Within shift from cultural nationalism to American transhemispheric relations, mestizo/a, migrant, or diasporic consciousness necessarily faces challenge of coming to grips with disparate nature of transnational conflicts. The socio-economic divisions between Third and First World that border metaphorically represents can be felt both in North and in South with different degrees of intensity and with site-specific dynamics that cannot be overlooked. We should consider, quoting Lora Romero, that the border cuts both ways (247) and that it cuts differently depending on which side we find ourselves. Thus, in crossing over into Latin America, writer will have to grapple with representation of those who live south of border and may want to cross legally or illegally in opposite direction with purposes and socio-cultural backgrounds that differ considerably from hers or his. A discussion of representation of turn-of-this-century transnational migration by a second-generation like Ruben Martinez will always be tied to issues of otherness, for interaction between Mexican and will bring to fore responses in accordance with writer's cultural, gender, class, and racial position north and south of border. As Amitava Kumar observes, post-colonial writing acquires a preeminent critical potential when an experience of migration and travel is used to dwell on a global condition of displacement, but it is also then that this writing reveals its shortcomings at representing those whose voice is often silenced (10). …