26
February
2018
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07:00 AM
Europe/Amsterdam

Author and Academic Rachel Ida Buff Discussing New Book About History of Anti-deportation on March 1

Article by: Rosa Linda Reynoso

Despite being characterized as a “nation of immigrants,” the United States has seen a long history of struggles concerning immigrant rights. In her timely book, Against the Deportation Terror, Rachel Ida Buff uncovers and examines this multiracial facet of our country’s history.

This Thursday, March 1, the author will present a free guest lecture at Del Mar College (DMC).

The event is sponsored by the College’s Social Sciences Department and begins at 7 p.m. in Room 514 of White Library, located on the East Campus (Naples off Kosar at Staples). This lecture is open to the public. For more information, email DMC faculty member Dr. Dawson Barrett at dbarrett2@delmar.edu.

In Against the Deportation Terror (Temple University Press, 2017), Buff traces the history of anti-deportation activists––the American Committee for the Protection of the Foreign Born (ACPFB)––ranging from their origins in the 1930s to repression during the early Cold War to engagement with “new” Latino and Caribbean immigrants in the 1970s and early 1980s; after which, the organization folded into the American Civil Liberties Union.

Functioning as a hub connecting diverse foreign-born communities and racial justice advocates, the ACPFB responded to various, ongoing crises that they called “the deportation terror.” Advocates worked against repression, discrimination, detention and expulsion in migrant communities across the nation while supporting reform of federal immigration policy. Prevailing in some cases and suffering defeats in others, the story of the ACPFB is characterized by persistence in multiracial organizing even during periods of protracted repression.By tracing the work of the ACPFB and its allies over a half-century, Against the Deportation Terror provides an important historical precedent for contemporary immigrant rights continuing to resonate today.

Buff serves as a history professor and coordinator of Comparative Ethnic Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Brown University and a doctoral degree from the University of Minnesota. Additionally, she serves as editor of the American Association of University Professors’ online Journal of Academic Freedom, editor of Immigrant Rights in the Shadows of Citizenship and author of Immigration and the Political Economy of Home: West Indian Brooklyn and American Indian Minneapolis, 1945–1992.

About Del Mar College

Del Mar College empowers students to achieve their dreams. We offer quality programs, individual attention, outstanding instruction through faculty with real-world experience and affordable costs to credit and noncredit students in Corpus Christi and the South Texas Coastal Bend area. Nationally recognized while locally focused, we’re ranked in the top two percent of community colleges in the country granting associate degrees to Hispanic students (Community College Week). Del Mar College focuses on offering our students programs that match current or emerging career opportunities. Whether students are interested in the fine arts, sciences, business, occupational or technical areas, students get the education they need for the future they want at Del Mar College.