Immigration Article of the Day, Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and the Integration of Central American Unaccompanied Minors by Luis Edward Tenorio

Today’s immigration article of the day comes from Luis Edward Tenorio, a PhD student in sociology and Chancellor’s Fellow at Berkeley. It’s Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and the Integration of Central American Unaccompanied Minors, The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, November 2020, 6 (3) 172-189.

Although research has advanced our understanding of immigrant integration, understanding how this integration occurs in concert with or in contrast to legal processing remains unexplored. Drawing on ethnographic research of the lived experiences of Central American unaccompanied minors, this analysis focuses on how special immigrant juvenile (SIJ) status affects the initial integration of unaccompanied minors into the key social institutions of the home, school, and work. I argue that the integration effects of SIJ status are two-pronged. The first involves the effects of the process and structure of legal relief, in this case, through a bifurcated system of local (family court) and federal governance (immigration court and federal agencies). The second encompasses the collateral effects on the unaccompanied minor’s social networks and relationships.

This article is part of a special issue published by the Russel Sage Foundation, The Legal Landscape of U.S. Immigration in the Twenty-First Century, edited by Professor Katharine M. Donato of Georgetown University and Professor Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes of the University of California, Merced. In their powerful introduction to the volume, they explain how the issue will “explore various aspects of the legal landscape for immigrants in the United States,” compiling articles that “vary widely in terms of focus and approach,” but that are joined in their focus on identifying “consequences of the legal visa system” and offering “a foundation for future research on the U.S. legal immigration system.”

I will be featuring more articles from this terrific issue in the coming days.

IE