Media, Migrants, and U.S. Border(s)

The relationship between migration and media has become an essential topic of study due to its ethical and civil responsibility implications, particularly in today's digitalized global environment. The media's narrative on world and regional politics, local and global economy, religion, war, and civil conflicts affects the experience of migration and diaspora. In response, artistic representations and cultural interventions have become forms of activism, resistance, and confrontation against the narrative of power. Likewise, the digital space began to be used more intensely as a place of activism for migrants and civil society interested in their human rights. For instance, digital archives such as Humanizing Deportation and social media are used to do activism, the first one through digital storytelling, where migrants can express their deportation stories on video, and the second one uses digital circulation to create community and as a call for action. Artistic- Technological interventions such as Playas de Tijuana Mural (2019) use art and technology to protest the politics of migration by portraying family separation. Theater intermedial performances use virtual spaces to represent distance and the resistance to it. Cinema shows the social and political implications of their visual narrative. Finally, new practices, concepts, and models in AI, journalism, and internet freedom have created a rhetoric that could benefit migrants. Migration is usually seen through numbers, statistics, graphics, and quantitative data, which dehumanizes migrants. With this book, we aim to contribute to the knowledge of the phenomena through the lenses of a more humanistic approach to activism in digital media in the Hispanic world. We propose chapters that explore the activism of migrants and civil society committed to them from a critical perspective. This book, intended to be read by students, researchers, and the public interested in migration, presents interdisciplinary approaches to activist narratives, art, and digital. It explores diverse types of migrations and related phenomena, such as deportation, “voluntary” return, caravans, the Cuban diaspora, US childhood arrivals, and the particularities of the Southern U.S. border. These topics are analyzed in essays on race, politics, theater, film, music, painting, journalism, multimedia, digital archives, social media, storytelling, and artificial intelligence. In the abstracts, you will find diverse perspectives on how digital media act as platforms that allow horizontal activism, which is a direct response at the same level as the rhetoric of power. Likewise, the proposed essays enable us to reflect on the role of arts and media in favoring the expression of the migrant community and those who share a common feeling. Still, in the same way, we will see how digital media, if misused, can also harm vulnerable communities. Work by newer and established migration studies, digital culture scholars, and scholars from both sides of the US-Mexico border and other latitudes is incorporated, providing a comprehensive overview of the intersection between migration, media, and arts in Latin America. The book will consist of an Introduction and 13 chapters divided into three sections: 1. Media and Digital Media Artists´Activism; 2. Migrant Activists Online; and 3) Activism through New Constructive Practices. Editors: Rubria Rocha de Luna, Postdoctoral Researcher, Tecnológico de Monterrey Jacob Bañuelos Capistrán, Professor, Tecnológico de Monterrey

Rubria Rocha de Luna is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Tecnologico de Monterrey, where she conducts research on Digital Humanities, Digital Rhetoric, Migration, and Social Justice. She is also the Co-founder and Director of Networks for Migrants without Borders (Redes, migrantes sin fronteras), a non-profit digital initiative that connects the migrant population with civil associations that support them. She completed her doctoral studies in Hispanic Studies, specializing in Visual Culture and Digital Humanities at Texas A&M University.

Dr. Jacob Bañuelos Capistrán is a prominent Mexican researcher in the field of digital culture and visual semiotics. Holding a doctorate in Information Sciences (Apto Cum Laude) from the Complutense University of Madrid, he has developed a prolific career at the Tecnologico de Monterrey, where he currently serves as a Research Professor. Dr. Bañuelos is a member of the National Researchers System (SNI) since 2005 - he is currently SNI-2. His main research lines are articulated around the relationships between image, technology and culture, currently with greater emphasis on the phenomena of image, culture and artificial intelligence.