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This is an introduction to a collection of articles -- 'Affecting Global Movement: The Emotional Terrain of Transnationality' -- that explores discourses of emotion related to global movement. Research on migration rarely captures the affective and emotional dimensions of global processes. This issue is part of an emergent body of scholarship that bridges work on transnational migration with examinations of affect and emotion. Here, we discuss several common themes that the papers collectively address: how emotion shapes, negotiates, and mediates connectedness and disconnectedness along lines of nation, community, and/or kin; the relationship between emotionality and materiality; and the emotional aspects of structural power dynamics in diverse contexts. Such study can inform and aid in the development of policies that incorporate emotional experiences, thereby improving transnational lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers diverse migrations from Mexico to the United States, driven by a range of factors, in the context of violence that circulates transnationally. Throughout Mexico violence and kidnappings, increasingly targeted at migrants or their family members, are motivating increased or new flows to the north. Meanwhile, in the United States, nativism is fostering anti-immigrant policies and practices – also framed by violence – aimed at “returning” Mexican nationals south. Such processes are resulting in a simultaneous blurring and reassertion of categories: distinctions between individuals with different motivations to migrate are not easily delineated, and in this case, individuals themselves often experience a form of “mixed migration”, with people migrating both for economic reasons and because they fear for their safety. Drawing on ongoing ethnographic research about migration and deportation, I outline recent experiences of transnational Mexicans to highlight contradictions within United States–Mexico migration and consider the implications for policy. In the current climate of United States immigration control, the possibility of claiming asylum within the United States is unlikely for nearly all Mexicans, underscoring the limitations of categorisation within refugee protection and immigration regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Scholars have suggested that migration from Mexico to the United States benefits women by challenging often rigid gender norms. The results of ethnographic field research in San Luis Potosí and New Mexico complicate this view. Here migration results in a complex interplay between males and females—a series of negotiations through which women exercise increased autonomy in some circumstances but also face the reassertion of male dominance and in which males reproduce patriarchal power even as they create new ways to express masculinity. This research problematizes previous understandings of the impact of migration on gender roles and underscores the need to make a gendered analysis central to theories of transnationalism and the study of (im)migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction to articles about immigration is presented, including an article by Deborah A. Boehm regarding masculinity and immigration, an article by Cymene Howe, Susan Zaraysky and Lois Lorentzen regarding transgender sex workers, and a study by David Karjanen regarding employers in California and their control of labor.