Fragile families : foster care, immigration, and citizenship /
Naomi Glenn-Levin Rodriguez.
- 222 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.
- Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights .
- Pennsylvania studies in human rights. .
Includes bibliographical references (pages 183-211) and index.
"Worthy" migrants -- Belonging and exclusion - Working the gap -- Decisions, decisions -- Intimacies.
In the past decade, debates over immigrant rights and family rights, and accompanying concerns over birthright citizenship, have taken center stage in popular media and mainstream political debates. These debates, however, frequently overlook the role of the public child welfare system in the United States--the agency charged with protecting children and maintaining the integrity of families. Based on research conducted in the San Diego-Tijuana region between 2008 and 2012, Fragile Families tells the stories of children, parents, social workers, and legal actors enmeshed in the child welfare system, and sheds light on the particular challenges faced by the children of detained and deported non-U.S. citizen parents who are simultaneously caught up in the immigration system in this border region. Many families come into contact with child welfare services because of the precariousness of their lives--unsafe housing, unstable employment, and the conditions of violence, drug use, and domestic violence made visible by the heightened police presence in impoverished communities. Naomi Glenn-Levin Rodriguez examines the character of child welfare decision-making processes and how discretionary decisions constitute the central avenue through which race, citizenship, and other cultural processes inflect child welfare practice in a manner that disproportionately impacts Latina/o families--both undocumented and U.S. citizens. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork to look at how immigration enforcement and child welfare play central roles in the ongoing production of citizenship, race, and national belonging, Fragile Families focuses on the everyday experiences of Latina/o families whose lives are shaped at the nexus of child welfare services and immigration enforcement -- Book jacket.
9780812249385 0812249380
13885598
2017288993
Child welfare--California--San Diego. Immigrant children--Institutional care--California--San Diego. Foster home care--Children--California--San Diego. Children of immigrants--Social conditions.--California--San Diego Immigrant families--Social conditions.--California--San Diego Children of immigrants--Legal status, laws, etc.--California--San Diego.