Synopses & Reviews
Winner of the 2010 Distinguished Book Award from the American Sociological Association, Sociology of Sexualities Section Winner of the 2010 Distinguished Book Award in Latino Studies Honorable Mention from the Latin American Studies Association
The Sexuality of Migration provides an innovative study of the experiences of Mexican men who have same sex with men and who have migrated to the United States.
Until recently, immigration scholars have left out the experiences of gays and lesbians. In fact, the topic of sexuality has only recently been addressed in the literature on immigration. The Sexuality of Migration makes significant connections among sexuality, state institutions, and global economic relations. Cantú; situates his analysis within the history of Mexican immigration and offers a broad understanding of diverse migratory experiences ranging from recent gay asylum seekers to an assessment of gay tourism in Mexico. Cantú uses a variety of methods including archival research, interviews, and ethnographic research to explore the range of experiences of Mexican men who have sex with men and the political economy of sexuality and immigration. His primary research site is the greater Los Angeles area, where he interviewed many immigrant men and participated in organizations and community activities alongside his informants.
Sure to fill gaps in the field, The Sexuality of Migration simultaneously complicates a fixed notion of sexual identity and explores the complex factors that influence immigration and migration experiences.
Review
&8220;In this path-breaking book, which is startling for what it reveals and what it innovates, Cantú shows how sex and the state are intimately related in one of the greatest dramas of our time, international migration. The Sexuality of Migration is a work of inspiration, integrity, and scholarly creativity.”
-Perrette Hondagneu-Sotelo,author of God's Heart Has No Borders: How Religious Activists Are Working for Immigrant Rights
Synopsis
Spanning four decades of debate on slavery and antislavery, this provocative volume by leading historian Seymour Drescher provides an in-depth comparative analysis of the transatlantic slave trade and abolition movements of nineteenth-century Europe and the Americas, and their ongoing impact on twentieth-century politics and race relations.
Leading up to his influential argument that the end of slavery was not due to economic decline, but rather caused it, Drescher's early analyses focus on the dynamic interaction of economic modernization, religion, and politics in early industrial nations. Challenging the reigning historical models, Drescher expands the scope of abolition scholarship to include such overlooked contributors to the slave question as planters, merchants, Parliament, abolitionist Saints, and the working classes.
More recently, Drescher has turned his attention to the compelling new questions arising from Black-Jewish relations in the United States, the role of Jews in the Atlantic slave trade, and the comparative barbarism of two great moral evils in recent world history: slavery and the holocaust.
Valuable both for the vast timespan covered and its wide geographic range, From Slavery to Freedom represents a major contribution to the study of slavery and abolition by one of its most distinguished historians.
About the Author
Lionel Cantú, Jr. (1965-2002), was an Assistant Professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz in the Department of Sociology.
Nancy A. Naples is Professor of Women's Studies and Sociology at the University of Connecticut. She is the author of many books, including Feminism and Method: Ethnography, Discourse Analysis, and Activist Research and Grassroots Warriors: Activist Mothering, Community Work, and the War on Poverty.
Salvador Vidal-Ortiz is Assistant Professor of Sociology at American University. His work has appeared in journals such as Qualitative Sociology, Sociology Compass, and Sexualities, and books such as Gay Religion and Latinos/as in the United States: Changing the Face of América.