Immigrant Dreams of Returning Home

Here’s an interesting upcoming talk at UC San Diego of the Dreams of Mexican Migrants:
RESEARCH SEMINAR SERIES
Spring Quarter 2008

Joint Seminar with Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies

The Mexican Dream: The Imagined Return Among International Migrants from Rural Mexico

Javier Serrano
Social Anthropologist, Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología (CIESAS), Visiting Fellow, CCIS

Tuesday, April 22, 3:00 PM
Eleanor Roosevelt College Administration Building
Conference Room 115, First Floor
Reception to follow

Two seemingly oppositional myths sustain Mexican migration to the United States. One myth leads migrants to the north and it promises prosperity and material achievements. It is the American Dream. The other points to the south. It is the myth of The Return to Paradise which is based on the deep desire to return to one’s hometown. These contrasting myths form a great paradox for migrants. They usually move abroad with the idea to return once they have improved their situation, in economic and other terms. Although migrants do not always go back, the imagined return persists for a long time in their minds. This study focuses on ways in which migrants imagine a better future, a future made possible by migration. Therefore, these powerful images of a more prosperous tomorrow inspire migrants. As an alternative to studies that treat migration as a purely demographic and economic phenomenon, this study views massive migration as inspired by significant hope. However, migrants’ hope is rooted in and focused precisely on their hometowns. Migrants often plan their return before leaving. Because their imagined return remains such a powerful idea, migrants remain embedded in their original systems of prestige, economy, and power. This paradox of migrants leaving home in order to return is what I refer to as the “Mexican Dream.”

Dr. Javier Serrano began his studies in social anthropology at the Universidad Nacional de La Plata (UNLP) in Argentina. He later completed his master’s and doctorate at the Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social (CIESAS) in Mexico. Currently, he is a Visiting Research Fellow at CCIS. His work on migratory processes has focused on the Patagonia region of Argentina and several states in western and southern Mexico. In the past, he has done work on economic phenomenon from a cultural perspective. Currently, he is carrying out research on the hopes and aspirations of labor migrants and preparing his manuscript “The Mexican Dream: The imagined return among international migrants from rural Mexico” for publication.
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These seminars are open to all members of the UCSD community, as well as faculty and students from other universities and the general public. For directions to CCIS, visit our website. Parking permits can be purchased at the information booth on North Point Drive (north end of campus). Visitors may also use metered parking spaces (max. 2 hours) in the North side parking lot. Papers previously presented at CCIS seminars can also be downloaded from our website under “Working Papers.” For further information, please contact Ana Minvielle (E-mail: aminvielle@ucsd.edu, Tel#: 858-822-4447).

Center for Comparative Immigration Studies
9500 Gilman Drive
University of California, San Diego
La Jolla, CA 92093-0548

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