Threshold
Subtitle: emergency responders on the US-Mexico border
By: Ieva Jusionyte
Series: California series in public anthropology -- 41; California series in public anthropology -- 41.
Publisher: University of California Press
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 285
ISBN-13: 9780520297173; 9780520297180
Copyright date: 2018
Subjects: Emergency medical services; Rescue work; Social aspects; Emigration and immigration
Description: "Emergency responders on the US-Mexico border operate at the edges of two states. They rush patients to trauma centers across state lines, tend to the broken bones of migrants who jump over the fence, and put out fires that know no national boundaries. Paramedics and firemen on both sides of the border are tasked with saving lives and preventing catastrophe in the harsh terrain at the center of divisive national debates. Ieva Jusionyte's years of experience as a paramedic provide the background for her gripping examination of the politics of injury and rescue in the militarized region surrounding the US-Mexico border. Operating in this area, firefighters and paramedics are torn between their mandate as frontline actors and their responsibility as medical professionals, and between the limits of law and pull of ethics. They occupy a position from which we can understand the practical dilemmas and the conceptual paradoxes of sovereignty and governance. Through beautiful ethnography and a uniquely personal perspective, Threshold provides a new way to understand politicized issues ranging from border security and undocumented migration to public access to healthcare today."--Provided by publisher.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-271) and index.
Table of contents: title: Dead end; title: Treacherous Terrain; title: First due to the border; title: Binational security; title: Toxic statecraft; title: Politics of wounding and of rescue; title: Nogales, Arizona, Mexico; title: Fence jumpers; title: Tactical infrastructure; title: Por otro lado; title: Overpaid tomato pickers; title: Accidental violence; title: Brotherhood; title: Red tape; title: Maquiladora; title: Acid rain; title: Road to rocky point; title: Staging; title: Security of the future; title: Load vehicles; title: The man in black dress pants; title: Bound by law; title: Watchouts; title: Aid is not a crime; title: Land of many uses; title: Some pill to help us walk; title: Epilogue : the great new wall.