TO COME AND GO: TRANSNATIONAL LIFE BETWEEN MEXICO AND ALASKA by Sara Victoria Komarnisky M.A., University of Manitoba, 2006 B.Com., University of Alberta, 2003 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (Anthropology) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) April 2015 © Sara Victoria Komarnisky, 2015 Abstract This dissertation examines the experiences of place and patterns of transnational mobility of three generations of people who have been living between Acuitzio del Canje, Michoacán, Mexico and Anchorage, Alaska, USA for several decades. These people hold dual US-Mexican citizenship or US permanent residency and are able to move across the continent in a way that many Mexican migrants cannot. Based on twelve months of ethnographic research in both Acuitzio and Anchorage, and ten years of engagement with people in these locations, I analyze the experience of Acuitzences (people from Acuitzio) at several levels: as they encounter frictions in their movements between Michoacán and Alaska; the practices of multigenerational family units who gain traction over time to build lives in both Anchorage and Acuitzio; the uneven and situated habits that generate a transnational class formation, and the ways in which Mexicans in Alaska re-conceptualize their senses of place by developing transnational identities out of the symbols and mechanisms of both nation-states. In showing how distance is key to the experience of Mexican migrant-immigrants in Alaska, this research also contributes to theorizations of the relevance of distance in the creation of spatialized differences. My analysis reveals that over time, Acuitzences in Alaska orient their lives to both locations as they live, work, and imagine their futures across the continent. Acuitzences in Alaska have created a transnational social field and orient themselves more to the field as a whole than to any one location in it. For most of them, Acuitzio, Anchorage, and the experience of mobility between the two places are necessary to feel at home in the world. These findings contribute to the anthropological research on mobility, citizenship, transnational migration, and the production of space, and bring the spatially bounded fields of Circumpolar Studies and Latin American Studies together. Based on this, I advocate for a transnational approach to theory and policy that embraces the multiple trajectories that construct places. Despite policy restrictions to migration, the lives of transnational Acuitzences who come and go show how the United States and Mexico are profoundly coproduced geographies. ii Preface This dissertation represents original and independent work by the author, Sara Komarnisky, who designed the research program, performed all aspects of the research program, and analyzed all data. The author is therefore solely responsible for any errors and/or omissions in this document. Portions of Chapter 1, 3 and 4 appear in the following publication: Komarnisky, Sara V. (2012) Reconnecting Alaska: Mexican Movements and the Last Frontier. Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics 6(1): 107-122 The following copyrighted materials are reproduced here with permission: Road Between Tiripetio and Acuitzio, 1966 (© Raymond E. Wiest) Chichén Itzá-Chugach (© Bart Roberts) Chichén Itzá-North Slope (© Bart Roberts) Chichén Itzá-Zitácuaro (© Bart Roberts) Interior Michoacán, Mexico, was adapted with permission from © Raymond E. Wiest (1970) Wage-Labour Migration and Household Maintenance in a Mexican Town. PhD Thesis. Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon. Alaska, USA (© Paul Hackett) and Air and Road Routes between Mexico and Anchorage, AK (© Paul Hackett) were created using base data from the Commission for Environmental Cooperation Natural Resources Canada, Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía, and the National Atlas of the United States. No use constraints are applied to data for Mexico and the United States of America. All data for Canada and other areas outside of Mexico and the United States of America are covered by the Geogratis License Agreement for Unrestricted Use of Digital Data; see http://geogratis.cgdi.gc.ca/geogratis/en/licence.jsp. This research was approved by the UBC Behavioural Research Ethics Board under the title “I Can See Mexico From My House: Producing, Imagining, and Belonging in a Transnational Alaska,” Certificate Number H11-00985-A002 (Principal Investigator: Dr. Gastón Gordillo). iii Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... ii! Preface ........................................................................................................................................... iii! Table of Contents ......................................................................................................................... iv! List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ vi! List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. vii! List of Abbreviations ................................................................................................................. viii! Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... ix! Dedication ..................................................................................................................................... xi! Chapter 1: Introduction – “Yes, There Are Mexicans in Alaska” ............................................1! Mexicans in Unexpected Places .................................................................................................. 3! Mexicans in Alaska ................................................................................................................... 12! Frictions, Paradoxes, and Power Geometries of Mobility ........................................................ 21! Organization of the Thesis ........................................................................................................ 24! Chapter 2: North American Fieldwork – Between Acuitzio and Anchorage .........................27! When Your Field Site Leaves You ........................................................................................... 27! Multi-sited Ethnography ........................................................................................................... 28! Acuitzio, Michoacán, México ................................................................................................... 31! Anchorage, Alaska, USA .......................................................................................................... 41! Tracing Mexican Alaska ........................................................................................................... 46! Routes Between ........................................................................................................................ 49! Looking for Similarities ............................................................................................................ 52! Methodological Practice in Transnational Space ...................................................................... 56! Conclusion ................................................................................................................................ 63! Chapter 3: The Annual Migration of the Traveling Swallows – Friction, Distance, and Transnational Mobility ................................................................................................................64! Frictions of Distance ................................................................................................................. 69! Air Crossroads of the World ..................................................................................................... 78! From Morelia to Mexico City to Los Angeles to Seattle ...................................................... 80! Crossing Borders ....................................................................................................................... 93! Lemons for Good Luck: Citizenship and Mobility ............................................................... 95! Highways of North America ................................................................................................... 103! Out of Place: Roads to Acuitzio .......................................................................................... 105! A Beautiful and Tragic Voyage: Traveling the Alaska Highway ....................................... 109! Conclusion: A Farewell Song ................................................................................................. 117! Chapter 4: “My Grandfather Worked Here” – Generation, Gender, and Travel Back and Forth ............................................................................................................................................120! The Bravo Family: Spatializing Kinship ................................................................................ 127! The First Generation ............................................................................................................... 132! Producing Alaska ...............................................................................................................