By Joel Zapata, Assistant Profesor in the School of History, Philosophy and Religion at Oregon University
Latina/os have joined communities, filled jobs in various sectors, and made local economies flourish throughout the United States. To study this, the fields of borderlands and Latina/o studies have responded with promising geographical growth. Scholars from both fields are teaching budding students not only in such cities as San Diego, Tucson, El Paso, and Miami but also in the towns and cities of states like Nebraska, Kansas, and Iowa. Groundbreaking books and articles of Latina/os and their community building in Arkansas, Mississippi, the Dakotas, and other locales are in print. Perhaps more importantly, more books and articles are in development. Such work is decentering the traditional sense of place within borderlands and Latina/o studies, pushing both fields deeper into the nation’s interior.1 This process has led to a richer understanding of Latina/os, the United States, and their various borderlands.
United Fronteras in its first phase, Mexico-United States borderlands, features two digital projects that are at the foreground of furthering our understanding of borderlands and Latina/os: Southern Colorado Borderlands and Rural Immigration Network (RIN). Southern Colorado Borderlands reminds us that the U.S.-Mexico Border was not always set at the Rio Grande. Before 1848 it was hundreds of miles north along the Arkansas River that originates in Colorado. Along the Rocky Mountains-Great Plains borderlands of Southern Colorado, Indigenous people, ethnic Mexicans, Anglo Americans, Europeans, empires, and nations have met. Part of an exhibit at El Pueblo History Museum, Southern Colorado Borderlands illuminates the continuous regional and ethnic-cultural borders present in Colorado via historic images, maps, and other research materials. Notably, Southern Colorado Borderlands reminds us that Latina/os, especially those of Mexican origin, have a deep history in what is now the United States that predates the American Revolution.
Rural Immigration Network focuses upon mostly recently formed Latina/o communities. However, much as Southern Colorado Borderlands, Rural Immigration Network serves the broad public. Using community-based research practices, Katherine Tegtmeyer Pak (St Olaf College) worked alongside students and other professors to create the project in 2014, and it continues to grow. Rural Immigration Network is geared towards advocates, teachers, health care providers, community planners, volunteers, public officials, as well as other groups and individuals seeking to make rural locations better places to live. It does so through an interactive map that exhibits various community organizations across the nation, especially in the rural Midwest. Via this tool, visitors to the digital project can find healthcare, educational, and other community-service organizations near them. In addition, the project shares helpful social science research through clearly written essays, which link to more in-depth sources. Overall, Rural Immigration Network, “allows community builders to learn from others like themselves, creating an online network that stretches across geographic distances and highlights efforts to empower and support immigrant newcomers in rural areas.” 2
Rural Immigration Network focuses on connecting people to better individual and community life in a myriad of ways. Southern Colorado Borderlands centers on historical education for the public. Together, Southern Colorado Borderlands and Rural Immigration Network reveal the broad geographies and time spans borderlands and Latina/o scholars must consider. Ultimately, by interconnecting scholarship and digital tools, these projects demonstrate the academic, social, and cultural potential of digital humanities.
1 See, for example, Perla M. Guerrero, Nuevo South: Asians, Latinas/os, and the Remaking of Place (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2017); Julie M. Weise, Corazón de Dixie: Mexicanos in the U.S. South since 1910 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2015); Refugio Rochin, “Latinos on the Great Plains: An Overview,” Great Plains Research 10 (Fall 2000): 243-252; Bryan Winston, “Mexican Community Formation in Nebraska, 1910-1950,” Nebraska History, 100 (Spring 2019): 3-19.
2 “What is the Rural Immigration Network (RIN)?” Rural Immigration Network, https://ruralimmigration.net/about2-page/.