Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2019 - Social & Behavioral Sciences — Anthropology

This fine study of the effects of immigration policies and practices on the children of illegal Mexican immigrants could not be more timely. Millions of children in the US live in households where one or both parents lack legal documents for living and working in the US. Children who grow up in such households, though they may themselves be citizens, face special challenges--fear of deportation of a parent, family mobility problems in service of avoiding arrest, difficulties in accessing health care and social services, and reduced parental involvement with school systems, to mention just a few of the issues. Over the course of a decade sociocultural and medical anthropologist Christina Getrich (Univ. of Maryland, College Park) interviewed and followed a group of teenagers, turned young adults, in San Diego who experienced such challenges and responded and adapted to them, often in constructive and empowering ways. Amply documented with examples from the lived experience of Getrich's study participants, this readable account sheds light on an area of immigrant experience that reverberates across generations.Summing Up: Essential. All readers.