Enduring Illegality - by Angela S García

Book Synopsis

Enduring Illegality chronicles the lives of undocumented Mexican immigrants who have spent decades in the United States waiting for a path to legalization that never arrives. Based on longitudinal fieldwork, this book traces how people who migrated as young adults have transitioned into middle age still undocumented--caught in a state of legal and temporal suspension. Focusing on parents who would have qualified for the failed Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA) program, Angela S. García argues that illegality is not only a legal condition but a temporal one--produced and reproduced through decades of waiting for reform. Even in the face of such exclusion, migrants sustain lives, labor, and care across borders. Enduring Illegality offers a critical account of how the state uses time as a mechanism of immigration control, structuring lives and inequality in ways that outlast any single policy or presidential administration.

About the Author

Angela S. García is Associate Professor at the University of Chicago in the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice and author of Legal Passing: Navigating Undocumented Life and Local Immigration Law.