Borderland artists, poets, journalists and other regional culture bearers will gather in 做厙勛圖 this weekend for a symposium challenging dominant media narratives about the US-Mexico border by centering the work of those who live and create there.
The two-day symposium includes a free public event on Saturday night at 做厙勛圖s Museum of Contemporary Art to celebrate the launch of University of Arizonas Reclaiming the Border Narrative , a grant-funded online project three years in the making.
Archival work empowers community members to collect and preserve their own stories and creative work, said Javier Duran, founding director of the UAs Confluence Center for Creative Inquiry, an archival partner in the project. It aims to elevate voices from the border and fill gaps in the historical record through collaboration with dozens of borderlands creators.
People are also reading…
Archives are not just esoteric spaces that are kept in an institution or library, but archives are also a way to build community, Duran said. Border narratives not only get neglected, but hijacked, by mainstream media. This is an attempt to bring the local narratives of the border into a more prominent light.
Saturdays celebration will feature a keynote address by renowned Mexican-American author and poet Luis Alberto Urrea. Among his works are the nonfiction book, The Devils Highway, the true story of a group of 26 migrants deadly 2001 journey through the southern Arizona desert, and the novel, The Hummingbirds Daughter, a fictionalized account of Urreas own family legend, which he spent 20 years researching and writing.
For those with deep roots in the borderlands, national media coverage often rings false and unfamiliar, says Maritza F矇lix, Mexican journalist and founder of , a nonprofit bilingual news outlet based in Phoenix. F矇lix, who launched Conecta Arizona during the pandemic, will be a speaker and panel moderator during the symposiums invitation-only portion.
In panel discussions across the country, F矇lix said shell often start by asking, What is the first thing you think of when I say the word border?
In New York, the response is often asylum seekers, F矇lix said. If I ask in Portland, theyll say drugs and smuggling and coyotes.
But the answer is different in border communities where, for many, daily life and family ties routinely transcend the physical border barrier, she said.
If I ask this question (about what the word border brings to mind) in southern Texas or Arizona, they will say: my wedding dress, the tamales, my kids soccer tournament that they have across the border. They say music, and love, she said. So it matters who tells the story.
This weekends symposium stems from the larger Reclaiming the Border Narrative project, a partnership between the Ford Foundation and The Center for Cultural Power, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists and the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures.
The Center for Cultural Power, led by women of color and based in Oakland, Calif., offers fellowships and training to mostly indigenous artists and artists of color, many of whom will be featured in the 做厙勛圖 symposium, said Favianna Rodriguez, co-founder and president of the nonprofit.
We believe very strongly in the power of art and culture to challenge engrained, dominant narratives that stand in the way of progress, Rodriguez said. When you Google the border region, so much of the content the TV shows, the articles, the cultural content is not reflecting the stories of the people who live there and who are experiencing a very resilient and beautiful region.
Politicians show up in border region for photo ops in front of the border wall, using the region as a political prop, said Duran of the UAs Confluence Center.
We have a lot of people coming from different places to create a border representation that is convenient for their agendas, he said. The border is not just immigration. We have our largest commercial partner next door (in Mexico.) Theres a lot of interdependence in many different aspects that get overlooked, and that includes culture and the arts.
The UAs Confluence Center is an interdisciplinary center that facilitates research and creative projects through mini-grants, and much of the work it supports has gravitated toward border issues, Duran said. In 2018, the center got a $800,000 grant from the Mellon Foundation for a project called Fronteridades, which elevates local border narratives.
Their work got the attention of the Ford Foundation, Duran said, which awarded a to the university in 2022 for the digital archive project. Grantees of the project will finally get a chance to meet in person during the 做厙勛圖 symposium, he said.
Imagine another way
A few decades ago, the border region was dramatically different, Rodriguez said. Today, a militarized border barrier divides human and animal populations, severing interconnected ecosystems and complicating cross-border exchange, she said.
There is room for us to imagine another way, and that is our power as cultural creators. We dont assume these narratives are frozen in place. They are the status quo, but the status quo can shift, she said. Its going to take other kinds of stories to shift that (perception).
Uplifting artists, as well as culture bearers people who are the keepers of ancestral traditions, such as maintaining an indigenous language can help others imagine another way forward, Rodriguez said.
This weekends symposium, which features a keynote address by award-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa, also focuses on the importance of representative journalism that reflects the lived experiences of its subjects, rather than externally imposed narratives, organizers say.
For F矇lix, its crucial to meet binational news consumers on the platforms they actually use. During the pandemic, her relatives in Mexico were receiving and sharing a lot of misinformation related to COVID-19 through the WhatsApp messaging platform, she said.
With the help of a grant from the Reclaiming the Border Narrative project, F矇lix decided to publish Conecta Arizonas journalism on the WhatsApp messaging app, which is widely used throughout Latin America not only for personal communication, but for sharing memes and news stories through large group chats and channels. Her Conecta Arizona channel, and its related podcast, now reaches thousands of people, she said.
WhatsApp is our jam. Its where our community is, she said.
F矇lix also hosts daily cafecitos on WhatsApp, in the form of a group chat that she opens up to member participation for one hour each day, in order to hear from her readers on the topics theyre interested in, from the Oscars to politics, she said.
Shes now training community members in reporting techniques, fact-checking and journalism ethics, she said.
For us, its not just the story, she said. It is crucial to understand the most valuable thing is who tells the story, as well.
Contact reporter Emily Bregel at ebregel@tucson.com. On X, formerly Twitter: @EmilyBregel
Emily Bregel
Border reporter
