‘Transborderism’ and Social Imaginary in the U.S.-Mexican Border

Stripes and Fence Forever: Homage to Jasper Johns
(1997) by Marcos Ramirez “Erre”
Norma Iglesias-Prieto
niglesia@mail.sdsu.edu
Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies
San Diego State University, 2012.
Photo: Norma Iglesias-Prieto

Basic Statements about
International Borders
• Borders are human constructions
• Historical. The U.S.-Mexican border
is the result of a war (1846–1848)
in which Mexico lost half of its
territory: Texas, Utah, Nevada,
Photo: KPBS, Espinosa
territory: Texas, Utah, Nevada,
Arizona, New Mexico, and California
An open wound/Llaga abierta
Photos: Norma Iglesias-Prieto

Basic Statements about
International Borders
• Borders are not natural but tend to use
natural barriers in order to naturalize them
• There are sophisticated cultural, social, and
political processes that naturalize borders,
but there are also sophisticated processes
that question their existencethat question their existence
• Borders are real and symbolic limits of
Nation States. Their main function is to limit
or control the free movement of people,
goods, ideas, cultures, ideologies, religions,
languages, etc.
• Borders are supported by the notion of
“others are dangerous” or “others are
problems and generate risks”

28°Political San Diego Ceuta Israel India China Hong Kong
Strategic location that
embodies the world’s
inequalities
- Concentration of wealth
- Areas of extreme tension
Borders as Laboratories
(of globalization, postmodernity, exclusion, inequality…)
http://www.politicalequator.org/
* Teddy Cruz
Map: dreamstime.com
28°
33°
Political
Equator*
Equator
San Diego
Tijuana
Ceuta
Melilla
Israel
Palestine
India
Kashmir
China Hong Kong
Shenzhen
Other Aspects of Inequality
Geographic criteria: North vs. South, Urban vs. Rural
Social criteria: Social Class, Ethnicity, Race, Gender

Border
• As a territory, as a geopolitical demarcation, as a boundary of a Nation
State
• As a socially and culturally produced space
• With legal forms and delimitations that generate a variety of individual
and social conditions
• This variety of conditions marks people’s experiences and social
representations
• Diverse conditions create a universe of symbolic constructions of the
borderborder
(N-S, with or without papers, by car or foot, day or night, woman or
man, in English or Spanish, for work or for shopping, on Monday or
Saturday, with B.C., California, or Sinaloa plates)

Borderisms or Borderlands
Borderisms or borderlands question the notion that culture is only tied to a
space and focuses more on:
• conditions
• cultural and social practices
• identity marks
• cultural and social forms of CONTROL and EXCLUSION
• mechanisms of liberation as forms of resistance or ways of questioning
structures of power
Humans cross borders in many waysHumans cross borders in many ways
Humans are crossed by many borderlands (borderisms) and in many ways

Borderisms or Borderlands
Borderisms as sites/conditions/identities that are vague, ambiguous, flexible,
hybrid, and in constant processes of transition.
Borderisms and Borderlands theory critiques the binary logic and emphasizes the
and, as well as the tensions, conflicts, contradictions, and negotiations of non-
fixed identities.
Borderisms and Borderlands theory underscores the possibility of being in several
places/conditions simultaneously, generating a series of third choices. The
expression of these multiple third choices is the best way of criticizing borders
as limits and controls and of criticizing the logic of separation and exclusion
(Anzaldúa).
Borders are there to be crossed
Photo:NormaIglesias-Prieto

Tijuana-San Diego as a Laboratory
With high levels of interaction, interdependence,
contrast, unbalance, asymmetry …

Tijuana works as a magnifier
of global social, economic,
environmental, and cultural
trends and conflicts.

Every border has at least two sides
• San Diego is not seen on
the U.S. side as a border
city. The border is only
associated to, and
recognized on, the Mexican
side.side.
• The border—in the national
social imaginary of both
countries—refers to
something negative. A place
of loss. The “border brings
the worst of both worlds”
(Touch of Evil, 1958).Photo: Norma Iglesias-Prieto

The position of the border as only on one side
reproduces and naturalizes asymmetry
• The Mexican side of the border
serves as the backyard of the U.S.
“Backyard available. In perfect natural state.
Ready to be used as a toxic, nuclear, or
industrial waste dump.”

San Diego
(mine)
Three theoretical approaches, border practices, and social identities (level of interaction and level of commitment,
awareness, understanding, acceptance, and social investment toward the neighboring city and its inhabitants )
San Diego
(mine, our, us)
USA
Non-Border, Border Dynamics
Bilateral, Binational
+- Collaboration
San Diego
(our)
San Diego
Transborder, Third
Space/Condition/Identity
E
x
c
h
a
n
U.S. National Identity
POWER
+
MEXICO
Tijuana
(yours, theirs, them)
+- emphasis on
separation, differences
Tijuana
(yours)
(our)
Tijuana
Borders refer to the Mexican side.
BORDER AS RISK AND DANGER
n
g
e
T
r
a
d
e Maintain differences but promote
collaboration for the benefit of
both cities.
BORDER AS OPPORTUNITIES
An integrated common space and condition.
TRANSBORDER AS A CONDITION
- Condition of life and meaning
- Levels of transborderism
(A condition that is flexible and includes
tension, conflict, and constant negotiation
and adaptation)
Border Identity
POWER
-
Source: Norma Iglesias-Prieto, 2012

Borderisms or Border/lands and
transborder/lands as a
condition of meaning
A relation
Transborderism as a condition of meaning
A relation
BORDER as
geopolitical
delimitations
(territoriality, areas
of legal
competences)
BORDERISMS or
BORDERLAND as
cultural and social
conditions
mark,
constrain,
mold,
affect
Border and
transborder
experience(s) mark,
constrain,
mold,
affect
Meanings
Social
Representations
Social
Imaginary
Individual
and Social

Social Representations as:
- Interpretations of reality
- Symbolic structures that attribute sense to reality
- Systems of codes, interpretive marks, value,
systems of classification
- Codes that define and guide behaviors and
orient collective practices
Artist: Marcos Ramírez Erre

Transborderism
Level and complexity of the experience on
both sides of the border.
The most intense, dense, and full-of-meaning
action in the transborder condition is the
act of crossing the international border. In
the act of crossing, subjects and processes,
define much of their identity.
Crossing (frequency, intensity, directionality,Crossing (frequency, intensity, directionality,
type or scale of activity, material and
symbolic exchange, social and cultural
meaning attached to the interaction, etc.)
Photos: Norma Iglesias-Prieto,

Transnational and Transborder
Transnational
TransborderTransborder
Diasporas/
Deterritorialized
Territorialized,
dense, intense,
simultaneous

A higher level of transborderism is associated with greater
cultural capacity and richness, increased complexity in the
ways people experience and perceive the border, and richer
concepts of self-identity.
“Taking the place of the
border, I have placed a
war trench, creating a
place neither from here
nor from there. When I
cross the border, I feel
I’m crossing a line of
war, a constant and
internal war that exists
in my mind, between my
two cultures and
identities: my Mexican
self and my American
self.”
Mental Map : SDSU students. Class CCS 355 Norma Iglesias-Prieto

Social Representation of the U.S.-Mexican Border
Direct relation
between the level of
transborder activity
and the level of
complexity in the
representation.
Four types or levels of
interaction and
representation thatrepresentation that
range from the most
basic sporadic,
commercial
interactions, to the
regular (daily)
intense interaction
of bilingual,
bicultural individuals
(many of them with
dual citizenship).
Mental Map : SDSU students. Class CCS 355 Norma Iglesias-Prieto

“The boundary is not a spatial fact
with sociological consequences,
but a sociological fact that forms
itself spatially.”
Georg Simmel
Artistic practices as processes
of liberation.
Border/lands, Transborderism, and Creativity
All mechanisms of control
have cracks.
All walls have holes.
Borderlands and holes
generate great energy and
great creative potential.
Border/lands, Transborderism, and Creativity
Photo: Norma Iglesias-Prieto,

Tijuana:
• Flexible
• Creative
• Chaotic
• Graphic
• Intense
• Dynamic
• Diverse
Tijuana is an inspirational location, the
muse, the studio, as well as the site
that provides topics, materials, and
conditions to CREATE.
Photo: Gabriela Juárez,
• Diverse
• Contrasting
• Fascinating
A location that:
• Confronts
• Inspires
• Challenges
Tijuana from “cultural desert” to “artistic hotspot”
Creativity, Art, and Agency
Photo: Gabriela Juárez,
Photo: inSite97,

The
Transborder
Condition in
Tijuana Art
• The subjects’/artists’
trajectories, activities,
dynamics in which he/she
participates
• The artists’ practices
(individual or network)
• Topics or themes of artTijuana Art
Practices is
Expressed
in:
• Topics or themes of art
pieces
• Form of art production
• Characteristics of artistic
events
• Audiences/publics
Photos: Norma Iglesias-Prieto,

Tony Capellán, El buen vecino/
The Good Neighbor, inSite97
The Transborder Perspective
Border as an open wound, as a barrier that divides people,
families, communities.
Photo: inSite97

Marcos Ramirez ERRE
inSite97
Toy-an Horse/Caballo de Troya
In the middle of the border
crossing, a two-headed
wooden horse; one body, two
directions, two different
projects, two opposing views,
but it can never move in
opposing directions.opposing directions.
Negotiation. Transparency in
cross-border relations.
Photos: inSite97

The body of crime (2008) by Marcos Ramirez ERRE
An installation consisting of a Chevrolet Suburban, bullets, video, wood and metal
wall pieces, photographs mounted on glass, and photographic prints.
A narcocorrido video parody of the drug trade in
Tijuana. The artist plays the role of three characters:
the assassin, the victim, and the police officer. He
thus stresses the responsibility shared by all in the
social reality we have constructed or we have
allowed. The three characters played by the same
person create confusion, as in the city, where nobody
knows who anybody is anymore. ERRE gatheredknows who anybody is anymore. ERRE gathered
forensic material and elements of the crime and
placed them on display in the gallery (the car, the
bullets, and the car radio playing narcocorridos). He
also includes photos of the three characters mounted
on mirrors with tags “I,” “You,” “Him” etched along
the bottom, and leaving the next pronoun—“we”—
open for the audience to fulfill. ERRE finally stresses
“us” and sets aside the discourse of victimization that
puts an emphasis on “others.” The project not only
problematizes issues of truth and identity, but it also
makes transborder responsibilities evident.
Photos: Marcos Ramírez “Erre”

An installation consisting of a Chevrolet Suburban, bullets, video, wood and metal
wall pieces, photographs mounted on mirrors, and photographic prints.
The body of crime (2008) by Marcos Ramirez ERRE
Photo: Marcos Ramírez
Photo: Marcos Ramírez

Jaime Ruiz Otis
• Produces art from industrial trash (Maquiladoras)
• Waste gained new meanings as art pieces and, by that,
dignified the work and the workers
• Industrial work is not only his theme but his main supplier
of materials
• He criticizes in his art pieces the asymmetrical relation
with the U.S. and the role of Tijuana as provider of cheap
labor and the backyard of the U.S.
• His art work critically approaches the logic of mass
production, repetition, homogeneous globalproduction, repetition, homogeneous global
consumption, toxic waste pollution , industrial urban
landscapes, etc.
Trade Marks series made from cuts that workers incised into plastic
sheets. The multiple squares or circles show the repetitiveness of
the work.
Photo: Jaime Ruiz Otis

Jaime Ruiz Otiz
• Requiem-Km 142
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2O3i_uH9Rc
Photos: Jaime Ruiz Otis and Norma Iglesias-Prieto

Joao Louro’s project The Jewel/In God We
Trust traces an inverted trajectory of the
recycling dynamics that characterizes the
border zone. His project begins with the
selection of a European car recovered from
a junkyard in Tijuana and transformed into
a “jewel” through the addition of golden
layers of paper. Once this trash object was
transformed into an opulent golden
sculpture, it was exhibited and auctioned in
San Diego. The money from the sale was
given to an elementary school in Tijuana
and it was used to support visual art
workshops for children (InSite 05).
Photos: inSite05

The rules of the game/
Las reglas del juego
By Gustavo Artigas
Four teams play in the same court at the same time. Two U.S.
teams play basketball and two Mexican teams play soccer. Both
sports represent cultural and national identities.
This artistic event suggests the possibilities of negotiations with
low conflict and respecting differences in a shared space.
Photos: inSite2000

One Flew Over the Void (Bala perdida), 2005: Transgression of Borders and Borderlands
Building on a collaborative process that is evident
throughout his artistic practice, Javier Téllez’s
project One Flew Over the Void (Bala perdida)
involved a sustained engagement with psychiatric
patients from the Baja California Mental Health
Center in Mexicali to co-create a public event and
to document its evolution and final performance.
Inspired by the traditional “human cannonball”
circus performer, Téllez explored the notion of
spatial and mental borders in the context of Tijuana
and San Diego. He developed an event that
involved sending a human cannonball across theinvolved sending a human cannonball across the
border between Mexico and the United States.
Through successive creative workshops and
exchanges, the world’s most famous human
cannonball, Dave Smith, the psychiatric patients,
and Téllez collectively devised the backdrop,
music, costumes, print advertising, and radio and
television announcements for the event. The
performance took place on August 27, 2005, at the
border fence between Playas de Tijuana and
Border Field State Park (inSite05).
Photos: inSite05

With Brinco, Judi Werthein created a project that links
migrants’ efforts to cross the border illegally with the
increasing global corporatization of goods and labor.
The project is a uniquely designed sneaker,
trademarked Brinco. The shoe design is inspired by
information and materials that are relevant to, and
could provide assistance to, those crossing the border
without documents. Underscoring the tensions sparked
by the global spread and mobility of the maquiladora,
Brinco (2005): Art Object or Useful Item?
by the global spread and mobility of the maquiladora,
the sneaker was manufactured in China. Counterpoint
to its potential for utilitarian use by Mexican migrants,
the sneaker was sold as a one-of-a-kind art object and
was available in the United States during inSite05 in a
high-end sneaker store located in a very nice area of
San Diego. In a single object, Judi reveals the
contradictions among fashion, competition in the
manufacturing industry, and migratory flows, themes
that lie at the heart of the dynamics of labor geography
in today’s world (inSite05).
Photos: inSite05

Brinco (2005): Art Object or Useful Item?

Daniel Ruanova
Photos: Norma Iglesias-PrietoPhoto: Daniel
Ruanova archive.

Children’s Social Representations
Project: The Other Side of the Line (2008)
One of the four phases of this project coordinated by Norma Iglesias Prieto
and Yvon Guillon consists in the creation of two short animated films by
children from Tijuana and San Diego based on the theme “The other side of
the line.” The cartoons that resulted were the work of twenty-two children
between the ages of 11 and 13, in two workshops offered by French
animated-film experts Sébastien Water and Guilles Coirier. Through the
workshops, children from each city produced a short animated film about
the children on the other side of the border. The two groups of children
discussed the way they think about and portray the other side.
Subsequently, the children came to consensus regarding the story,
characters, situation, context, sets, etc. They also wrote the script, built thecharacters, situation, context, sets, etc. They also wrote the script, built the
set and characters out of paper and fabric, shot the entire sequence of
scenes, recorded the soundtrack, and edited their respective film
animations.
The 22 children who participated in the project were of mixed gender and
possessed a variety of levels of transborderism and experiences of the
“other side.” This experience ranged from those who had never crossed the
border (usually because their parents had never wanted to, in the case of
San Diegans; or because they lacked a United Stated visa, in the case of
Tijuanenses); those who crossed regularly for reasons of family or school;
and those who at some time had lived on the other side/el otro lado. The
two short animated films (5 minutes each) are: Wacha el Border (2008) by
children from Tijuana, and Beyond the Border (2008) by children from San
Diego.

Children’s Social Representations
• Wacha el Border 2008) by
Children from Tijuana,
• Beyond the Border (2008) by
Children from San Diego
http://delotroladodelalinea.wordpress.com/
Through their film-making, the children of Tijuana and San Diego revealed strikingly
different attitudes and conceptions of each others’ cities. But their collaborations also
showed that taking an early interest in and working through children's imagery of the
borderlands, it is possible to generate more positive commitments to a collective
future in an increasingly integrated and diverse world.
Films available at:

‘Transborderism’ and Social Imaginary in the U.S.-Mexican Border

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‘Transborderism’ and Social Imaginary in the U.S.-Mexican Border