Unravels how US visa laws fail Indian professional workers and their legally dependent spouses and families The Opportunity Trap is the first book to look at the impact of the H-4 dependent visa programs on women and men visa holders in Indian families in America. Comparing two distinct groups of Indian immigrant families -families of male high-tech workers and female nurses-Pallavi Banerjee reveals how visa policies that are legally gender and race neutral in fact have gendered and racialized ramifications for visa holders and their spouses. Drawing on interviews with fifty-five Indian couples, Banerjee highlights the experiences of high-skilled immigrants as they struggle to cope with visa laws, which forbid their spouses from working paid jobs. She examines how these unfair restrictions destabilize-if not completely dismantle-families, who often break under this marital, financial, and emotional stress. Banerjee shows us, through the eyes of immigrants themselves, how the visa process strips them of their rights, forcing them to depend on their spouses and the government in fundamentally challenging ways. The Opportunity Trap provides a critical look at our visa system, underscoring how it fails immigrant families.

Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo (1807-90) grew up in Spanish California, became a leading military and political figure in Mexican California, and participated in some of the founding events of U.S. California. In 1874-75, Vallejo, working with historian and publisher Hubert Howe Bancroft, composed a five-volume history of Alta California-a monumental work that would be the most complete eyewitness account of California before the gold rush. But Bancroft shelved the work, and it has lain in the archives until its recent publication as Recuerdos: Historical and Personal Remembrances Relating to Alta California, 1769-1849, translated and edited by Rose Marie Beebe and Robert M. Senkewicz. In Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo: Life in Spanish, Mexican, and American California, Beebe and Senkewicz not only illuminate Vallejo's life and history but also examine the broader experience of the nineteenth-century Californio community. In eight essays, the authors consider Spanish and Mexican rule in California, mission secularization, the rise of rancho culture, and the conflicts between settlers and Indigenous Californians, especially in the post-mission era. Vallejo was uniquely positioned to provide insight into early California's foundation, and as a defender of culture and education among Mexican Californians, he also offered a rare perspective on the cultural life of the Mexican American community. In their final chapter, Beebe and Senkewicz include a significant portion of the correspondence between Vallejo and his wife, Francisca Benicia, for what it reveals about the effects of the American conquest on family and gender roles. A long-overdue in-depth look at one of the preeminent Mexican Americans in nineteenth-century California, Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo also provides an unprecedented view of the Mexican American experience during that transformative era.

Introduction to Latinx Studies: A Social Science and Cultural Studies Reader provides students with a collection of carefully curated primary sources and textbook style introductions that explore contemporary Latinx issues and experiences. In Unit I, Negotiating Identities, readings examine the various ways in which Latinx communities think about belonging and classification in the context of the U.S. Unit II, Resistance and Mobilizations, features scholarly primary sources that discuss issues related to race relations and social and political mobilizations. The third unit, Migration and Immigration, introduces readers to the broader context of U.S.-Latin American relations, globalization, and the effects of immigration policy and enforcement. In the final section, Critical Intersectionalities, readers engage with articles that examine intersections within the Latinx community. Dedicated readings explore the nuances of race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, and social stratification. Throughout, engaging introductions provide readers with necessary context for the selected articles and discussion questions that guide them in their understanding of the material. Research-based and timely, Introduction to Latinx Studies is an excellent main text for courses in the social sciences such as sociology, anthropology, political science and cultural studies courses with focus on contemporary Latinx issues and culture.