Migration Narratives Also available from Bloomsbury Identity, Culture and Belonging, Tony Eaude Issues and Challenges of Immigration in Early Childhood in the USA, Wilma Robles-Melendez and Wayne Driscoll Migration Narratives Diverging Stories in Schools, Churches, and Civic Institutions Stanton Wortham, Briana Nichols, Katherine Clonan-Roy and Catherine Rhodes BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2020 Copyright © Stanton Wortham, Briana Nichols, Katherine Clonan-Roy and Catherine Rhodes, 2020. Stanton Wortham, Briana Nichols, Katherine Clonan-Roy and Catherine Rhodes have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Authors of this work. Cover design: Charlotte James Cover images: © Katsumi Murouchi/ Getty images and © Oleksii Liskonih iStock / Getty Images Plus All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Wortham, Stanton Emerson Fisher, 1963- author. | Nichols, Briana, author. | Clonan-Roy, Katherine, author. | Rhodes, Catherine Rebecca, author. Title: Migration narratives : diverging stories in schools, churches, and civic institutions / Stanton Wortham, Briana Nichols, Katherine Clonan-Roy and Catherine Rhodes. Description: London ; New York : Bloomsbury Academic, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2020023058 (print) | LCCN 2020023059 (ebook) | ISBN 9781350181311 (hb) | ISBN 9781350181328 (ePDF) | ISBN 9781350181335 (eBook) Subjects: LCSH: Mexicans–United States–Social conditions–Longitudinal studies. | Immigrants–United States–Social conditions–Longitudinal studies. | United States–Race relations–Longitudinal studies. | African Americans–Relations with Mexican Americans. Classification: LCC E184.M5 W68 2020 (print) | LCC E184.M5 (ebook) | DDC 304.8/73–dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020023058 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020023059 ISBN: HB: 978-1-3501-8131-1 ePDF: 978-1-3501-8132-8 eBOOK: 978-1-3501-8133-5 Typeset by Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd., To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters. Contents List of Figures vi Preface vii 1 Intersecting Migrant Histories 1 2 Schools: Three Diverging Individual Mexican Pathways 37 3 Churches: An Emerging Irish-Mexican Community 75 4 Neighborhoods: Diverging Stories of Decline 109 5 Public Spaces: Victims, Revitalizers, and Competition 147 6 Community Organizations: Three Imagined Mexican Pathways 199 7 Powerful, Limited Stories 237 References 255 Index 266 Figures 1.1 The sun rises over downtown Marshall 9 1.2 The commuter train connecting Marshall to the region 18 2.1 Marshall Middle School 52 2.2 Bilingual sign outside of a Marshall elementary school 67 3.1 Church in Marshall 75 3.2 Early morning celebration of the Virgen de Guadalupe 83 3.3 Mexican and Irish food, side by side, at a St. Joseph’s celebration 97 3.4 Parishoners entering St. Joseph’s carrying the Mexican and American flags 107 4.1 For rent sign in Marshall’s East end 113 4.2 Parked cars along a downtown residential street 127 5.1 Mini-Mall catering to Mexican shoppers 162 5.2 A storefront on Main Street advertising money transfer services to Mexico 174 5.3 Polling station during municipal elections 190 6.1 Mexican folkloric dance exhibition 232 7.1 An aerial view of Marshall at sunset 237 7.2 Clouds parting after summer rain 254 Preface This book describes experiences of and stories about migration in one American town that became home to thousands of Mexican migrants between 1995 and 2016. Across those two decades the town’s Mexican population increased by over 1,000 percent, and Mexicans constituted almost a third of the town by 2016. The Hispanic population in the United States grew from 9 percent in 1990 to 18 percent in 2016 (Flores, 2017; Pew Research Center, 2017), and 23 percent of all schoolchildren in America in 2016 were Hispanic (Bauman, 2017). Because of their large numbers and relative youth, migrants from Latin America and their descendants will continue to play a crucial role in America’s future. Some expect that many of these migrants and their children will travel pathways similar to those imagined for previous migrant groups, like the Irish and the Italians, ultimately assimilating to the American mainstream (e.g., Gans, 2012; Levine, 2004). Others predict that they will face challenges similar to African Americans, facing racial injustice and ongoing struggle (Behnken, 2016; Jones, 2012; Manning, 2000). Both these predictions, and others, will surely turn out to be true in some cases— because migrants from Latin America are traveling divergent pathways (Alba & Nee, 2003; Portes & Rumbaut, 2001; Pew Research Center, 2008). In order to understand the likely futures of Mexicans and other migrants from Latin America, and in order to establish policies that will allow the United States to benefit from the advantages of ongoing migration, we need careful, empirically grounded accounts of Latin American migrants and the communities where they live in twenty-first-century America. Such accounts are particularly needed in the current political climate, which includes powerful but oversimplified and often inaccurate stories about migrants and their futures. The ascension of Donald Trump, Jeff Sessions, Stephen Bannon, and Stephen Miller in 2017 brought a formerly extremist, aggressively anti-migrant position to the center of American discourse, policy, and action. This position contrasts with the familiar, sympathetic story about America as a country largely composed of current and former migrants that has benefited from their energy, cultural traditions, and economic successes. America’s history is not that simple, of course, as African Americans and Native Americans can attest. But the country’s relative openness to migrants has yielded vibrant technologies, traditions, and viii Preface businesses, as well as a younger, more entrepreneurial population than in many comparable nations (Fairlie, Reedy, Morelix, & Russell, 2016; PennWharton, 2016; Trevelyan et al., 2016; Vandor & Franke, 2016). Despite failures along the way—including stereotyping and the racist mistreatment of migrants that have occurred throughout American history—the familiar, positive story about American migration concludes that the nation has succeeded by allowing smart, energetic people from around the world to mix and create in ways that benefit everyone. We will argue that this story is too simple, but that it nonetheless accurately describes some migrants’ aspirations and experiences. There has always been another vision of the country, one that considers newcomers a threat and tries to exclude them. On this view, migrants threaten “us.” They take “our” jobs, claim “our” money, and threaten “our” communities with crime and dangerous habits. This view of “others” has appeared throughout human history, in almost all times and places, although it waxes and wanes. This darker vision misrepresents some realities of migration, but not completely so. Migrants willing to work for lower pay can depress the wages of longstanding residents, for example, at least over the short or medium term (PennWharton, 2016). The longer- term consequences of migration are positive for the vast majority of residents (Bove & Elia, 2017; Nunn, Qian, & Sequeira, 2017a, b; Smith & Edmonston, 1997), but the US government has nonetheless recently justified cruel treatment of migrants and their families by telling stories that cast migrants as a threat to the nation. It is important to see that both these visions of migration in America oversimplify. They are stories that we tell about migration, stories which are true in some respects but false in others. Migrant communities and individuals move along diverging historical pathways. These varied pathways intersect with historical changes already underway in the communities that receive migrants, with varied outcomes for migrants and longstanding residents (Alba & Nee, 2003; López-Sanders, 2009; Smith, 2014). Changing host communities receive changing migrant communities, often yielding unexpected futures for newcomers and hosts. These more complex outcomes are not adequately captured by the triumphant story of migrant success, or by the pessimistic story of migrant-induced decline. We accept the strong scientific and ethical arguments that America will be most successful by welcoming migrants, instead of closing itself off in the cruel, cramped, self-defeating vision advanced by contemporary anti-migrant activists. We are not arguing that the two stories are equivalent. However, based on our empirical research, we claim that both these