“You need to think about the point of view of someone who leaves home to go several thousand miles to find a working-class job, knowing that when you cross the border you leave your rights behind. You will have found a place to work, but you are not able to vote, not able to organize, and, very literally, not able to hang out on the street. At home, you get the signal you are needed here, but when you get here you are also not wanted.” This is how filmmaker Alex Rivera, in an interview in this issue, describes the paradox of contemporary Latino/a labor migration. As long as immigrant workers stay behind the scenes, their brawn and skills are highly appreciated. However, their presence on street corners, in schools, parks, and stores has become highly contentious for urbanites as well as for suburban and exurban populations who believed they had left behind tensions over race, ethnicity, and class when they moved out of the metropolis.
