Migration and Border Studies

University of Notre Dame
230 McKenna Hall
574-631-4440

The Center for Migration and Border Studies (CMBS) pursues interdisciplinary research, scholarship, teaching, policy application, and community outreach on migration and migration-related issues. The mission of CMBS is to provide an intellectual base for researchers and scholars, graduate and undergraduate students dedicated to investigating and understanding the dynamics of migration flows and connections between migration and other domains—biological, economic, environmental, material, political, cultural, religious, and social.

The Director of Migration and Border Studies
Karen Richman, the director of Migration and Border Studies, is a cultural anthropologist who studies religion, migration, transnationalism, performance, gender, production and consumption. As a professor she has taught courses in anthropology, African American studies, gender studies, interdisciplinary core programs, Latino studies, and Romance languages. Her 2005 book Migration and Vodou (New Diasporas Series of the University Press of Florida) explores migration, religious experience, and ritual transformation in a far-flung Haitian community. Her current research projects are a study of Mexican-Americans’ culture of savings and an ethnography of a Mexican transnational family. She has worked as an advocate for refugees and immigrant workers in the United States. Her articles have appeared in edited books on migration and in the journals Anthropology and Humanism, Business Journal of Hispanic Research, Cimarrón, Ethnohistory, Folklore Forum, International Journal of Cultural Studies, Journal of Haitian Studies, Journal of Religion in Africa, Studies in Religion, New West Indian Guide, and Small Axe.

In September of 2009, Richman won the Robert F. Heizer Article Award by the American Society for Ethnohistory.

Past Projects
La Tercera Edad: Latinos’ Pensions, Retirement and Impact on Families
Latino workers are far less likely than other groups to be covered by employer-provided pensions or to be contributing to employer-based retirement savings plans. With limited individual assets, Latinos remain more vulnerable than other groups to low income and poverty. The study contributes to our understanding of the multiple causes and effects of Latinos’ lack of preparedness for retirement with the objective of informing policies that address the pressing need to bolster Latinos’ retirement security. The findings were widely disseminated through a bound report, three journal publications, and via the web and radio. The project was funded by the National Endowment for Financial Education and completed in 2008.

View the press release for La Tercera Edad: Latinos’ Pensions, Retirement and Impact on Families.

A list of other CMBS publications can be viewed here.

Current Projects
Understanding and Increasing Mexican Immigrants’ Financial and Retirement Security
Our recently completed project on Latino financial Literacy, La Tercera Edad, identified economic causes of Latinos' lower pension participation relative to other groups and raised new questions about the influence of social and cultural factors on retirement. Understanding the dynamic nature of Latino family structure, size, and norms is crucial to figuring out how to devise communication, curricula, and policies that will help increase immigrants' financial literacy and likelihood of retirement coverage. The purpose of this follow-up project is to conduct an in-depth study of how Latino immigrants prepare—or do not prepare—for retirement, focusing on Chicago’s large and growing Mexican immigrant population. This project is funded by the National Endowment for Financial Education.

Latino Immigrants’ in South Bend: An Applied Research Project
Latinos, primarily Mexican immigrants, now comprise about 11 percent of South Bend’s population. The purpose of the project is to contribute to an understanding of these new residents, including their health status, educational attainment, housing, community involvement, religious activities, civic participation, entrepreneurship, transnational networks, or cultural integration. The project is aimed to helping healthcare professionals and service providers design culturally sensitive policies.

This project features student involvement in community-based learning and research, which resulted in the launching of our Student Research Series. These newsletter-style publications are intended to inform scholars, community leaders, service providers, and the public at large about Mexican immigrants in South Bend. The eight issues published in 2008 and 2009 investigate the innovative adaptations and challenges of this immigrant community, including the growth of an ethnic enclave of small businesses, churches, and agencies that both unite Mexicans as an immigrant group and sustain their ties to Mexico.

This project is supported by University of Notre Dame President’s Circle and the Saint Joseph Regional Medical Center Foundation.

Migration, Development in Central Mexico: Collaboration with Fundacion del Bajio
The Center for Migration and Border Studies is collaborating with the Bajio Foundation of Central Mexico and the May Foundation of Chicago to do applied research and service in communities that have been deeply affected by migration. Three students at the Center conducted research and service in Guanajuato during the summer of 2009 on the causes and effects of emigration of workers from an agricultural town and the in-migration of tourists and residents from North America. Two other students are participating in creative workshops in theatre and boxing for adolescents and young adults that bring together youth in a Guanajuato community heavily affected by out-migration and Latino youth in Chicago. The MacArthur and May Foundations fund the program.

Selected Activities on Campus
Working Group on Migrants’ Transnational Political Engagement and Civic Participation An interdisciplinary faculty and graduate student working group co-sponsored by the Kellogg Institute and co-organized with Prof. Jorge Bustamante. The group’s activities include study and discussion of published research, presentations of faculty members’ works in progress, meetings with international political leaders visiting campus, and lectures by invited guest lecturers representing both academic and applied perspectives.

Haitian States: A Kellogg Institute Regional Workshop An interdisciplinary workshop in May 2007 for scholars in the Midwest, both professors and advanced graduate students, involved in scholarship and policy on Haiti and Haitian migration. Co-sponsored by the Kellogg Institute.

Migration/Documented, Film Series, Fall Semester, 2007 This series involved lectures and screenings of documentary films on migration from around the world. The series was co-sponsored by the Institute for Latino Studies, Kellogg Institute for International Studies, Africana Studies, the Kaneb Center for Teaching and Research, International Studies, and the College of Arts and Letters.

Caribbean Diasporas, Film Series, Spring Semester, 2008 Notre Dame faculty lectured on and led discussions of seven films on Caribbean immigration and emigration. The series is co-sponsored by the Institute for Latino Studies, Kellogg Institute, the Kaneb Center, American Studies, and Gender Studies.

Selected Directed Student Research Projects
Heidi Eckstein, Tourism, Emigration and Development in Central Mexico, Summer 2009. The project was supported by the Notre Dame Office of Research and is being conducted in collaboration with the Fundacíon del Bajio (Guanajuato).

Prisma Garcia, Migration and Medical Tourism in Central Mexico, Summer 2009. The project was supported by the Notre Dame Office of Research and is being conducted in collaboration with the Fundacíon del Bajio (Guanajuato).

Gregory Podolej, Ethnic Transitions in South Bend’s Immigrant Communities, Spring 2009. Directed readings/independent project.

Prisma Garcia and Maria Moreno, Health Concerns of Central & South American Migrants in Tapachula, Fall 2008. The project was funded by the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program, College of Arts and Letters, University of Notre Dame.

Cristina Crespo, Gender Status and Reproductive Health among Internal migrants in Cusco, Summer 2008. The project received funding from the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program, College of Arts and Letters, University of Notre Dame.

Emilie Prot, Latino Religions in South Bend, 2008. Independent study toward completion of a Latino studies minor.

Emilie Prot, Migration, Gender, and Health: A Case Study in Guanajuato, Summer 2009. This research focuses on Tamaula, a rural community in Guanajuato, Mexico, the base of a transnational community which extends to Georgia in the United States. The project, based on ethnographic research, explores how the mothers, wives, and daughters of migrants are engaged in health care and healing.

Photographs taken by Karen Richman at the March 10, 2006 pro-immigrant rally in Chicago.