Narratives of Deservingness and the Institutional Youth of Immigrant Workers

Autor/in	Gleeson, Shannon
Titel	Narratives of Deservingness and the Institutional Youth of Immigrant Workers
Quelle	In: Association of Mexican American Educators Journal, 9 (2015) 3, S.47-61 (15 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
Schlagwörter	Personal Narratives; Immigrants; Undocumented Immigrants; Program Descriptions; Federal Legislation; Work Environment; Justice; Crime; Work Experience; Educational Attainment; Access to Education; Models; Rewards; Employers; Law Enforcement; Youth; Advantaged; Barriers; Interviews; California; Texas + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Erlebniserzählung; Immigrant; Immigrantin; Immigranten; Illegaler Aufenthalt; Bundesrecht; Arbeitsmilieu; Gerechtigkeit; Crimes; Delict; Delicts; Delikt; Employment experience; Job experience; Occupational experience; Berufserfahrung; Bildungsabschluss; Bildungsgut; Education; Access; Bildung; Zugang; Bildungszugang; Analogiemodell; Reward; Belohnung; Gesetzesvollzug; Jugend; Jugendlicher; Jugendalter; Interviewing; Interviewtechnik; Kalifornien
Abstract	This article speaks to the special issue's goal of disrupting the deserving/undeserving immigrant narrative: 1) the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which provides temporary deportation relief and work authorization for young adults who meet an educational requirement and other criteria, and 2) current and proposed pathways to legal status for those unauthorized immigrants who come forward to denounce workplace injustice, among other crimes. For each of these categories of "deserving migrants," I illuminate the exclusionary nature each of these requirements, which pose challenges especially for those workers who have education and work experience. As such, I argue for the importance of an institutional perspective on youth. Specifically, I demonstrate how the educational required sanctioned by DACA privileges a select few individuals who have access to formal educational institutions of deserving, while ignoring other empowering but non-traditional models of worker education. I also examine those mechanisms that reward workers who come forward to contest employer abuse. These include the current U-Visa program, which opens a path to legal status for those select claimant who have been harmed by employer abuse and aid criminal investigations (e.g. Saucedo, 2010). In a similar vein, some advocates and legal scholars have proposed a pathway to citizenship for those workers involved in collective organizing (e.g. Gordon, 2007, 2011). I weigh the benefits and exclusivity of each pathway for addressing the precarity of the millions of undocumented immigrants currently in the United States. In doing so, I highlight how institutions have unevenly incorporated immigrant workers, creating wide categories of vulnerability that go ignored. That is, demographically young immigrants are often privileged as deserving, as are those institutionally mature workers who have been successfully incorporated by civic organizations and legal bureaucracies. Meanwhile, institutionally young immigrants--those who have been excluded from these spaces--are framed as undeserving. As a result, rather than see legal status as a pathway to incorporation, it is extended as a reward for those who have surpassed longstanding barriers. (As Provided).
Anmerkungen	Association of Mexican American Educators. 634 South Spring Street Suite 908, Los Angeles, CA 90014. Tel: 310-251-6306; Fax: 310-538-4976; e-mail: executivedirector@amae.org; Web site: http://www.amae.org.
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2020/1/01