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# Olga Odgers-Ortiz, REMI Correspondent in Mexico

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, correspondante de la REMI au Mexique

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, corresponsal de la REMI en México

## Olga Odgers-Ortiz

Translator: Olga Odgers-Ortiz

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OpenEdition
Journals

**Electronic version**

URL: https://journals.openedition.org/remi/29707

DOI: 10.4000/15ar4

ISSN: 1777-5418

**This article is a translation of:**

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, corresponsal de la REMI en México - URL : https://journals.openedition.org/remi/29700 [es]

**Publisher**

Université de Poitiers

**Printed version**

Date of publication: November 1, 2025

ISBN: 978-23-81940-30-4

ISSN: 0765-0752

**Electronic reference**

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, "Olga Odgers-Ortiz, REMI Correspondent in Mexico", *Revue européenne des migrations internationales* [Online], vol. 41 - n°2 et 3 | 2025, Online since 01 November 2025, connection on 11 December 2025. URL: http://journals.openedition.org/remi/29707 ; DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/15ar4

This text was automatically generated on December 11, 2025.

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Olga Odgers-Ortiz, REMI
Correspondent in Mexico

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, correspondante de la REMI au Mexique

Olga Odgers-Ortiz, corresponsal de la REMI en México

Olga Odgers-Ortiz

Translation : Olga Odgers-Ortiz

Since 1998, I have been a researcher at El Colegio de la Frontera Norte (Tijuana, Mexico), a member of the Mexican National System of Researchers since 2001, and a member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. I have been a visiting professor at the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme (Paris), the University of Rennes 2, EHESS (Paris), and the University of Paris 3.

My research focuses on the sociocultural impact of Mexico-U.S. migration, with special attention to processes of identity redefinition and to the relationships between migration, religion, and health. I am the author or editor of eight books and have published more than thirty peer-reviewed articles in indexed journals. I currently serve as editor-in-chief of the journal *Migraciones Internacionales*.

What new directions are your research taking, and in what ways do they reshape your understanding of international migration?

In recent years—together with Dr. Olga Olivas and Dr. Ietza Bojórquez, from El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, and Professor Thomas Csordas, from the University of California at San Diego—I have focused on studying the strategies through which migrants and asylum seekers at Mexico's northern border seek to maintain or restore their physical and mental health. In addition to analysing the barriers they face in accessing public health services, we aim to understand how migrants assemble therapeutic practices from various systems of meaning.

These combinations include alternative medicine, religious healing, esoteric practices, and biomedicine, and they take the form of self-care or consultations with specialists.
We argue that these health-seeking strategies are relational and situated: they are shaped through interaction with others—migrants and non-migrants alike—and are influenced by the specific characteristics of the places traversed. We focus in particular on two key concepts: therapeutic assemblages, understood as dynamic combinations of care practices drawn from different systems of knowledge and belief; and therapeutic itineraries, which refer to the transformation and adaptation of these strategies throughout the migratory journey.

How has the field of migration studies evolved within the political and disciplinary context of your country in recent years, particularly with regard to methodologies, research objects, and theoretical frameworks? What is the place of scientific knowledge in public debates on migration?

More recently, the tightening of border controls and the hardening of mobility policies have forced migrants to confront increasing obstacles along their routes. As a result, they are often compelled to remain for extended periods in unchosen, intermediate locations, experiencing uncertainty, precarity, and vulnerability.

In dialogue with authors such as Agier (2008), Collyer (2010), Gil Everaert (2020), Hess (2012), among others, we refer to this situation as migratory entrapment (Odgers et al., 2023). This concept refers to the experience of forced immobility that migrants face when, despite their willingness to continue moving, they are compelled to remain in place indefinitely due to institutional, legal, or material barriers.

Migratory entrapment has become a defining feature of migration flows directed toward the Mexico-U.S. border—a trend that intensified during Donald Trump's second presidential term—but it is not limited to this territory; it is increasingly observed in other regions of the world as well.

We therefore argue that migratory entrapment should be analysed as a structural characteristic of contemporary migratory flows.

How would you characterize the current publishing landscape in your country in the field of migration studies? What types of journals, formats, or readerships presently structure the circulation of knowledge in this domain?

Academic evaluation systems increasingly prioritize publication in indexed journals, particularly those listed in Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus. While this criterion aims to ensure quality standards, it has also generated exclusionary effects in terms of access to and visibility of scholarly knowledge.

A significant proportion of these journals are not open access or impose article processing charges (APCs) to make content freely available. This situation has been the subject of considerable critique, as it disproportionately disadvantages researchers in countries with weaker economies. On the one hand, they are often unable to access paywalled articles in their field; on the other, they lack the resources to cover APCs, which limits the visibility of their work in comparison to that of colleagues affiliated with better-funded institutions.

For this reason, it is essential to defend alternative publishing models, such as open access journals that do not impose costs on either authors or readers. Such is the case of *Migraciones Internacionales* and REMI, which combine high editorial standards with free access and publication. However, sustaining this model is increasingly difficult in an editorial landscape marked by deep structural inequalities.
Currently, in Mexico, *Migraciones Internacionales*—published by El Colegio de la Frontera Norte—is the only specialized journal in this field that is indexed in Scopus (Q2) and offers completely free open access for both authors and readers. Its continuity represents an ethical, political, and academic commitment to the democratization of knowledge, and it depends on institutional support and public funding.

How do you engage, in your research, with emerging modes of publishing and “journal-making” (open access, artificial intelligence, etc.)?

Artificial intelligence (AI) presents a major challenge for both authors and academic journals. Its use can facilitate processes such as editing, translation, bibliographic search, and the analysis of large volumes of information, thus reducing costs and increasing efficiency in editorial and research workflows.

However, its adoption raises ethical, epistemic, and political dilemmas that must not be underestimated. On the one hand, it may exacerbate existing inequalities—between those who can afford paid tools and those who cannot; between generations with differing levels of digital literacy; and between journals backed by major publishing conglomerates and those managed by public institutions.

On the other hand, the widespread use of models trained predominantly on English-language, commercially published content tends to reproduce the structural biases that already affect the circulation of academic knowledge.

One particularly troubling risk is the homogenization of knowledge: as more people rely on the same tools to write, search, or summarize, academic practices may increasingly conform to dominant formats, languages, and sources. This could undermine the epistemological diversity that is essential for critically engaging with complex phenomena such as migration.

## BIBLIOGRAPHY

Agier Michel (2008) *Gérer les indésirables. Des camps de réfugiés au gouvernement humanitaire*, Paris, Flammarion.

Collyer Michael (2010) Stranded migrants and the fragmented journey, *Journal of Refugee Studies*, 23 (3), pp. 273-293, [online]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/jrs/feq026

Gil Everaert Isabel (2020) Inhabiting the Meanwhile: Rebuilding Home and Restoring Predictability in a Space of Waiting, *Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies*, 47 (19), pp. 4327-4343, [online]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2020.1798747

Hess Sabine (2012) De-naturalising transit migration. Theory and Methods of an Ethnographic Regime Analysis, Population, Space and Place, 18 (4), pp. 428-440, [online]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/psp.632

Odgers-Ortiz Olga, Olivas Hernández Olga Lidia and Bojorquez-Chapela Ietza (2023) *Waiting in Motion. Migrants' Involvement in Civil Society Organizations While Pursuing a Migration Project*,
*Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies*, 21 (4), pp. 624-636, [online]. DOI: https://doi.org/
10.1080/15562948.2022.2155335

INDEX

**Palabras claves:** pericia, estudios migratorios, proyección internacional

**Keywords:** expertise, migration studies, international visibility

**Mots-clés:** expertise, études migratoires, rayonnement international

AUTHORS

OLGA ODGERS-ORTIZ

Sociologist, Professor, El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, Tijuana, Mexico; https://orcid.org/
0000-0002-9656-8877; odgers[at]colef.mx

TRANSLATORS

OLGA ODGERS-ORTIZ