Fear as a Group Emotion in Mixed-Status Immigrant Ecuadorian Community in Queens, New York
Authors: Lemekh Halyna 
Published: January 2025

Executive Summary

This study foregrounds fear as a group emotion shared by members of the Ecuadorian immigrant community in Queens, New York. The study is based on 30 in-depth interviews collected through ethnographic fieldwork in an Ecuadorian enclave in 2022–2023. It illuminates how fear, as a group emotion, instilled by “illegality,” is experienced by first-generation, 1.5-generation, and second-generation immigrants. Group fear experienced by members of the mixed-status immigrant community stems from collective and cumulative fear. This study defines collective fear as an emotion prevailing in mixed-status immigrant communities because of vulnerability from their undocumented status and marginalization passed on to members through socialization. Collective fear affects group dynamics and intergroup interactions, with debilitating effects on its members; however, it has positive functions, cementing social bonds between immigrants and solidifying the community. Another aspect of group fear is cumulative fear, defined in this study as the totality of fears experienced by first-generation, 1.5-generation, and second-generation Ecuadorian immigrants. First-generation immigrants express fear of border crossing, fear of detention and deportation, and fear of uncertainty during the legalization process. Meanwhile, 1.5-generation immigrants convey retrospective fear of crossing the border, fear of detention and deportation, fear of uncertainty during the legalization process, fear of liminal status restrictions, and fear of termination of the temporary protective status granted to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients. Second-generation immigrants, as jus-soli citizens of the United States, report fear of family separation and sympathy toward undocumented community members. Collective fear disseminated through numerous in-group (among community members) and inter-group interactions (community members and interior immigration enforcement) and learned through socialization provides empirical evidence of the “top–down” influence of group members’ experiences on emotions. Conversely, cumulative fear is based on individuals’ immigrant experiences cohering through the “bottom–up” influence of shared emotion on group formation. The only way to eradicate this group fear is to adjust one’s undocumented status, leading former undocumented immigrants to feel guilty about their acquired freedom, as their family members may still live in the shadow of “illegality.” This study demonstrates that U.S. President Joe Biden’s executive order aimed at keeping American families together cannot eliminate the overall paralyzing fear in immigrant communities. Given that the policy will affect an insignificant number of people, drastic measures are needed. The following policy recommendations are offered:

• Allow non-citizen spouses and children to adjust their unresolved immigrant status unconditionally (removing the requirement of residence in the U.S. for 10 years or more).

• Grant all recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program legal permanent resident status as a pathway to U.S. citizenship.

• Allow all liminally legal 1.5-generation immigrants to pursue education and careers through legalization.

• Forbid deportation of U.S. citizens’ parents, forgive most undocumented immigrants’ unauthorized entry into the country, and allow them to adjust their status.