Migrant “Illegality” and Deportability in Everyday Life
Abstract
▪ Abstract This article strives to meet two challenges. As a review, it provides a critical discussion of the scholarship concerning undocumented migration, with a special emphasis on ethnographically informed works that foreground significant aspects of the everyday life of undocumented migrants. But another key concern here is to formulate more precisely the theoretical status of migrant “illegality” and deportability in order that further research related to undocumented migration may be conceptualized more rigorously. This review considers the study of migrant “illegality” as an epistemological, methodological, and political problem, in order to then formulate it as a theoretical problem. The article argues that it is insufficient to examine the “illegality” of undocumented migration only in terms of its consequences and that it is necessary also to produce historically informed accounts of the sociopolitical processes of “illegalization” themselves, which can be characterized as the legal production of migrant “illegality.”
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All migrations are composed as historically specific products of the intersections of particular formations of human mobility with the distinct political and legislative histories of particular states and their consequent legal economies of meaning and differentiation.
“All migrations, after all, are composed as historically specific products of the intersections of particular formations of human mobility (migratory movements) with the distinct political and legislative histories of particular states and their consequent legal economies of meaning and differentiation (De Genova, 2002).”
From The Queer Politics of Migration: Reflections on “Illegality” and Incorrigibility (2010) · cites this paper as De Genova, 2002
Different legal statuses (documented, undocumented) would be inconceivable were it not for the value they produce to society, and they are fundamentally inseparable from citizenship.
“as De Genova (2002) notes, the different legal statuses-documented, undocumented-would be inconceivable were it not for the value they produce to society, and, as such, they are fundamentally inseparable from citizenship.”
From Liminal Legality: Salvadoran and Guatemalan Immigrants' Lives in the United States (2006) · cites this paper as De Genova 2002
The proliferation of interconnections among states and individuals has involved the emergence of a sociohistorically particular configuration of migrant illegality.
“The proliferation of such interconnections has involved 'the emergence of a sociohistorically particular configuration of migrant illegality' (De Genova 2002, p. 424).”
From Liminal Legality: Salvadoran and Guatemalan Immigrants' Lives in the United States (2006) · cites this paper as De Genova 2002
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Selections from the prison notebooks
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Liminal Legality: Salvadoran and Guatemalan Immigrants' Lives in the United States
Menjívar, C. (2006) · American Journal of Sociology · doi:10.1086/499509 · Cited by 1,393 · see citing works
Who are the “illegals”? The social construction of illegality in the United States
Flores, R. D., & Schachter, A. (2018) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.1177/0003122418794635 · Cited by 303 · see citing works
Enriquez, L. E. (2015) · Journal of Marriage and Family · doi:10.1111/jomf.12196 · Cited by 222 · see citing works
The Queer Politics of Migration: Reflections on “Illegality” and Incorrigibility
De Genova, N. (2010) · Studies in Social Justice · doi:10.26522/ssj.v4i2.997 · Cited by 209 · see citing works
Self-citationStealing Time: Migration, Temporalities and State Violence
(2021) · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-69897-3 · Cited by 99 · see citing works
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US Immigration Policy and the Case for Family Unity
Gubernskaya, Z., & Dreby, J. (2017) · Journal on Migration and Human Security · doi:10.1177/233150241700500210 · Cited by 49 · see citing works
Plotting a Moral Trajectory, <i>Sans Papiers</i>: Outlaw Motherhood as Inhabitable Space of Welcome
Willen, S. S. (2014) · Ethos · doi:10.1111/etho.12040 · Cited by 35 · see citing works
- Authors
- De Genova, N. P.
- Affiliations
- Department of Anthropology and Latina/o Studies, Columbia University, 1130 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10027;
- Venue
- Annual Review of Anthropology
- Publisher
- Annual Reviews
- Published
- 2002-10
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 419-447
- ISSN
- 0084-6570 (ISSN-L)
- 1545-4290
- OpenAlex
- W1979623874
- Cited by
- 3,505
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 294 · 2025: 224 · 2024: 222 · 2023: 369 · 2022: 205 · 2021: 242 · 2020: 295 · 2019: 236 · 2018: 248 · 2017: 195 · 2016: 148 · 2015: 119 · 2014: 142 · 2013: 141 · 2012: 97
- FWCI
- 7.14
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Annual Review of Anthropology (publishedVersion)
- Research Portal (King's College London) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Migration, Refugees, and Integration
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Migration and Exile Studies
- Social Sciences › Health › Migration, Racism, and Human Rights
- Keywords
- irregular migration, migrant illegality, deportability, illegalization
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