Name: Marlowe
Social Justice Group: DACA and Immigration
Date of Fieldwork: November 30, 2018
Name of Organization: N/A
Person (people) with whom I met and their job titles: DACA Recipient
Type of Fieldwork: Interview
What I did:
During this Fieldwork we interviewed a DACA (Differed Action for Childhood Arrivals) Recipient who’s status is in doubt after the recent actions of our President. The President has rescinded DACA and is activity trying to deport those young people. So, for that reason he wishes to remain anonymous as once the government has your name and your time expires, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) can show up to your house at any time and deport you.
What I learned:
Our group learned so much through this interview as he talked about his personal experiences of crossing the boarder. He recalled his family having to do it twice in one trip as they were caught one time. He went on to talk about the what plans immigrants have after their DACA expires, what DACA is doing to the immigrant community, and how important it is. One thing that struck me was a comment they made about the affect DACA has on the immigrant community. He said that there was a lot of tension in the immigrant community because DACA lays an outline for the idea that their are good immigrants and bad immigrants. This struck me because I had never had that perspective on that idea before. I had never thought about the large sums of people not under the safe umbrella of DACA. He then touched on the campaign for the Dream Act which would build a stronger path for more people to citizenship. Keep in mind DACA does not create a clear path to citizenship so most immigrants are more excited at the possibility of the Dream Act. Before this interview I hadn’t even given a thought about the people not protected by DACA so this really was an eye opening experience. I think that in the teach in I want to remember this because while a majority of people will think of DACA as a really good almost even savior for not citizens raised here, there is way more work to be done. But you could also say and speak on the idea that would you rather have a little by little improvement or improvement all at once. During the fieldwork I think that our whole group did a great job by responding and coming up with follow up questions. It almost stopped becoming an interview and more of a conversation which is what I think the goal of most interviews. I think in general during this interview with the DACA recipient we learned so much. We learned his whole story and personally one of the most interesting parts was also when he talked about how scared his family was when applying for DACA. He had to send his address and basically expose his whole family for being illegal immigrants. The interesting part of this story was the fact that his mom had been so selfless in this process by saying she did not have these opportunities when she was younger so he had to take them. While I can not summarize all of this amazing and detailed interview I learned so much more and will take these learnings with me throughout my whole life.
What I learned about Social Justice “work” and/or Civil and Human rights “work” from this fieldwork:
I learned how important it is for people to stand up in social justice work especially right now because if not over 800,000 bright young workers in America will be sent home to a country that isn’t even their home. So overall now is the time for people to stand up and be active, there is never a better time than to start now.
