Abstract

BUITRON VERA, Gabriela. Towards the Construction of a ‘Homemade Citizenship’ in Ilegal: reflexiones de un inmigrante indocumentado (2019), by José Ángel Navejas. Valenciana [online]. 2023, vol.16, n.32, pp.285-309.  Epub Dec 08, 2023. ISSN 2007-2538.  https://doi.org/10.15174/rv.v16i32.718.

This essay examines the book Illegal: Reflexiones de un inmigrante indocumentado (2019), by Jose Ángel Navejas. Through a close reading of this memoir, it proposes that the narrator articulates on the ways undocumented Mexican immigrants create spaces of allyship and belonging. To examine that, this essay draws from Mitchell’s (2020) concept of ‘homemade citizenship,’ which emphasizes that ‘belonging’ does not depend on civic inclusion or state recognition; but rather, belonging is a notion that is built through informal community practices. Hence, this investigation proposes that in Ilegal, the narrator affirms himself and integrates to the community through: 1) language and access to formal education, 2) the neighborhood of Pilsen, in Chicago, and 3) his family network. These informal spaces bestow the narrator with a sense of homemade citizenship.

Keywords : Mexican literature; Memoir; Homemade citizenship; Cultural citizenship; Informal social contract.

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