View the Table of Contents. Read the Introduction.

"Bender's got a noble goal: to show that the stereotypes Americans heap on Latino immigrants don't just make for rude conversation, they directly shape policy decisions. The book compellingly articulates just how deeply ingrained the images of lazy, thieving, drunkard Latinos and sexually voracious, fertile Latinas are in American culture."
--"City Limits"

"Is any society able to exist free of stereotypes? Steven Bender tackles the question head on as he dissects the cornucopia of Latino types, prototypes, and archetypes that populate our mendacious imagination. His answer takes us into the realms of politics, jurisprudence, and cartoons. It involves an attack on poverty, a strive for an equal, more honest educational system, and the 'reinvention' of the future tense in American English. Let Bender challenge your ignorance!"
--Ilan Stavans, author of The Hispanic Condition and On Borrowed Words

" is a typically insightful work by one of the most creative critical writers of our time."
--Berta Esperanza HernAndez-Truyol, University of Florida College of Law

"A hopeful and empowering challenge to those who work to transform American life."
'Gerald Torres, University of Texas School of Law

Although the origin of the term "greaser" is debated, its derogatory meaning never has been. From silent movies like "The Greaser's Revenge" (1914) and "The Girl and the Greaser" (1913) with villainous title characters, to John Steinbeck's portrayals of Latinos as lazy, drunken, and shiftless in his 1935 novel "Tortilla Flat," to the image of violent, criminal, drug-using gang members of East LA, negative stereotypes ofLatinos/as have been plentiful in American popular culture far before Latinos/as became the most populous minority group in the U.S.

In Greasers and Gringos, Steven W. Bender examines and surveys these stereotypes and their evolution, paying close attention to the role of mass media in their perpetuation. Focusing on the intersection between stereotypes and the law, Bender reveals how these negative images have contributed significantly to the often unfair treatment of Latino/as under American law by the American legal system. He looks at the way demeaning constructions of Latinos/as influence their legal treatment by police, prosecutors, juries, teachers, voters, and vigilantes. He also shows how, by internalizing negative social images, Latinos/as and other subordinated groups view themselves and each other as inferior.

Although fighting against cultural stereotypes can be a daunting task, Bender reminds us that, while hard to break, they do not have to be permanent. Greasers and Gringos begins the charge of debunking existing stereotypes and implores all Americans to re-imagine Latinos/as as legal and social equals.

This book explores the contested notion of compassionate migration in its discourse and practice. In the context of today's migration patterns within the Americas, compassionate migration can play a fundamental role in responding to the hardships that many migrants suffer before, during, and after their journeys. This volume explores the boundaries of compassion from legal, political, philosophical, and interdisciplinary perspectives, and supplies examples where state and non-state actors engage in practices of compassion and humanity through formal and informal regimes. Despite the lack of a concise and precise definition of the concept and practice of compassionate migration, all authors in this volume agree on the pressing need for more humane and compassionate treatment for those leaving their home country behind in search of a better life.

In Mea Culpa, Steven W. Bender examines how the United States' collective shame about its past has shaped the evolution of law and behavior. We regret slavery and segregationist Jim Crow laws. We eventually apologize, while ignoring other oppressions, and our legal response to regret often fails to be transformative for the affected groups. By examining policies and practices that have affected the lives of groups that have been historically marginalized and oppressed, Bender is able to draw persuasive connections between shame and its eventual legal manifestations. Analyzing the United States' historical response to its own atrocities, Bender identifies and develops a definitive moral compass that guides us away from the policies and practices that lead to societal regret. Mea Culpa challenges its readers. In a different era, might we have been slave owners or proprietors of a racially segregated establishment? It's easy to judge immorality in the hindsight of history, but what current practices and policies will later generations regret? More than a historical survey, this volume offers a framework for resolving some of the most contentious social problems of our time. Drawing on his background as a legal scholar, Bender tackles immigration, the death penalty, the war on terror, reproductive rights, welfare, wage inequity, homelessness, mass incarceration, and same-sex marriage. Ultimately, he argues, it is the dehumanization of human beings that allows for practices to occur that will later be marked as regrettable. And all of us have a stake in standing on the side of history that resists dehumanization.

One of the quintessential goals of the American Dream is to own land and a home, a place to raise one's family and prove one's prosperity. Particularly for immigrant families, home ownership is a way to assimilate into American culture and community. However, Latinos, who make up the country's largest minority population, have largely been unable to gain this level of inclusion. Instead, they are forced to cling to the fringes of property rights and ownership through overcrowded rentals, transitory living arrangements, and, at best, home acquisitions through subprime lenders. In Tierra y Libertad, Steven W. Bender traces the history of Latinos' struggle for adequate housing opportunities, from the nineteenth century to today's anti-immigrant policies and national mortgage crisis. Spanning southwest to northeast, rural to urban, Bender analyzes the legal hurdles that prevent better housing opportunities and offers ways to approach sweeping legal reform. Tierra y Libertad combines historical, cultural, legal, and personal perspectives to document the Latino community's ongoing struggle to make America home.

Now the most populous minority group in the United States, Latino/as increasingly need guidance on the everyday issues that affect their economic livelihood, their freedom, and their equal rights to dignity and opportunity. This comprehensive guide is organized around the three flashpoints that contribute to the unique legal treatment of Latino/as--immigration status, language regulation, and racial/ethnic discrimination. These points are examined in the venues of everyday life for Latino/as--from discrimination in housing to discrimination and language regulation in the workplace, to the lack of protection for immigrant labor, to classrooms where the bilingual education debate rages, to the voting booth and the criminal justice system where Latino/as confront racial profiling and language barriers.

"Courageous." -Ilan Stavans, author of Spanglish: The Making of a New American Language Robert Kennedy and Cesar Chavez came from opposite sides of the tracks of race and class that still divide Americans. Both optimists, Kennedy and Chavez shared a common vision of equality. They united in the 1960s to crusade for the rights of migrant farm workers. Farm workers faded from public consciousness following Kennedy's assassination and Chavez's early passing. Yet the work of Kennedy and Chavez continues to reverberate in America today. Bender chronicles their warm friendship and embraces their bold political vision for making the American dream a reality for all. Although many books discuss Kennedy or Chavez individually, this is the first book to capture their multifaceted relationship and its relevance to mainstream U.S. politics and Latino/a politics today. Bender examines their shared legacy and its continuing influence on political issues including immigration, education, war, poverty, and religion. Mapping a new political path for Mexican Americans and the poor of all backgrounds, this book argues that there is still time to prove Kennedy and Chavez right.

Examines LatCrit's emergence as a scholarly and activist community within and beyond the US legal academy Emerging from the US legal academy in 1995, LatCrit theory is a genre of critical outsider jurisprudence-a vital hub of contemporary scholarship that includes Feminist Legal Theory and Critical Race Theory, among other critical schools of legal knowledge. Its basic goals have been: (1) to develop a critical, activist, and inter-disciplinary discourse on law and society affecting Latinas/os/x, and (2) to foster both the development of coalitional theory and practice as well as the accessibility of this knowledge to agents of social and legal transformative change. This slim volume tells the story of LatCrit's growth and influence as a scholarly and activist community. Francisco Valdes and Steven W. Bender offer a living example of how critical outsider academics can organize long-term collective action, both in law and society, that will help those similarly inclined to better organize themselves. Part roadmap, part historical record, and part a path forward, LatCrit: From Critical Legal Theory to Academic Activismshows that with coalition, collaboration, and community, social transformation can take root.

Now the most populous minority group in the United States, Latino/as increasingly need guidance on the everyday issues that affect their economic livelihood, their freedom, and their equal rights to dignity and opportunity. This comprehensive guide is organized around the three flashpoints that contribute to the unique legal treatment of Latino/as--immigration status, language regulation, and racial/ethnic discrimination. These points are examined in the venues of everyday life for Latino/as--from discrimination in housing to discrimination and language regulation in the workplace, to the lack of protection for immigrant labor, to classrooms where the bilingual education debate rages, to the voting booth and the criminal justice system where Latino/as confront racial profiling and language barriers.

View the Table of Contents. Read the Introduction.

"Bender's got a noble goal: to show that the stereotypes Americans heap on Latino immigrants don't just make for rude conversation, they directly shape policy decisions. The book compellingly articulates just how deeply ingrained the images of lazy, thieving, drunkard Latinos and sexually voracious, fertile Latinas are in American culture."
--"City Limits"

"Is any society able to exist free of stereotypes? Steven Bender tackles the question head on as he dissects the cornucopia of Latino types, prototypes, and archetypes that populate our mendacious imagination. His answer takes us into the realms of politics, jurisprudence, and cartoons. It involves an attack on poverty, a strive for an equal, more honest educational system, and the 'reinvention' of the future tense in American English. Let Bender challenge your ignorance!"
--Ilan Stavans, author of The Hispanic Condition and On Borrowed Words

" is a typically insightful work by one of the most creative critical writers of our time."
--Berta Esperanza HernAndez-Truyol, University of Florida College of Law

"A hopeful and empowering challenge to those who work to transform American life."
'Gerald Torres, University of Texas School of Law

Although the origin of the term "greaser" is debated, its derogatory meaning never has been. From silent movies like "The Greaser's Revenge" (1914) and "The Girl and the Greaser" (1913) with villainous title characters, to John Steinbeck's portrayals of Latinos as lazy, drunken, and shiftless in his 1935 novel "Tortilla Flat," to the image of violent, criminal, drug-using gang members of East LA, negative stereotypes ofLatinos/as have been plentiful in American popular culture far before Latinos/as became the most populous minority group in the U.S.

In Greasers and Gringos, Steven W. Bender examines and surveys these stereotypes and their evolution, paying close attention to the role of mass media in their perpetuation. Focusing on the intersection between stereotypes and the law, Bender reveals how these negative images have contributed significantly to the often unfair treatment of Latino/as under American law by the American legal system. He looks at the way demeaning constructions of Latinos/as influence their legal treatment by police, prosecutors, juries, teachers, voters, and vigilantes. He also shows how, by internalizing negative social images, Latinos/as and other subordinated groups view themselves and each other as inferior.

Although fighting against cultural stereotypes can be a daunting task, Bender reminds us that, while hard to break, they do not have to be permanent. Greasers and Gringos begins the charge of debunking existing stereotypes and implores all Americans to re-imagine Latinos/as as legal and social equals.

Mexico and the United States exist in a symbiotic relationship: Mexico frequently provides the United States with cheap labor, illegal goods, and, for criminal offenders, a refuge from the law. In turn, the U.S. offers Mexican laborers the American dream: the possibility of a better livelihood through hard work. To supply each other's demands, Americans and Mexicans have to cross their shared border from both sides. Despite this relationship, U.S. immigration reform debates tend to be security-focused and center on the idea of menacing Mexicans heading north to steal abundant American resources. Further, Congress tends to approach reform unilaterally, without engaging with Mexico or other feeder countries, and, disturbingly, without acknowledging problematic southern crossings that Americans routinely make into Mexico.

In Run for the Border, Steven W. Bender offers a framework for a more comprehensive border policy through a historical analysis of border crossings, both Mexico to U.S. and U.S. to Mexico. In contrast to recent reform proposals, this book urges reform as the product of negotiation and implementation by cross-border accord; reform that honors the shared economic and cultural legacy of the U.S. and Mexico. Covering everything from the history of Anglo crossings into Mexico to escape law authorities, to vice tourism and retirement in Mexico, to today's focus on Mexican border-crossing immigrants and drug traffickers, Bender takes lessons from the past 150 years to argue for more explicit and compassionate cross-border cooperation.

Steeped in several disciplines, Run for the Border is a blend of historical, cultural, and legal perspectives, as well as those from literature and cinema, that reflect Bender's cultural background and legal expertise.

Examines LatCrit's emergence as a scholarly and activist community within and beyond the US legal academy Emerging from the US legal academy in 1995, LatCrit theory is a genre of critical outsider jurisprudence-a vital hub of contemporary scholarship that includes Feminist Legal Theory and Critical Race Theory, among other critical schools of legal knowledge. Its basic goals have been: (1) to develop a critical, activist, and inter-disciplinary discourse on law and society affecting Latinas/os/x, and (2) to foster both the development of coalitional theory and practice as well as the accessibility of this knowledge to agents of social and legal transformative change. This slim volume tells the story of LatCrit's growth and influence as a scholarly and activist community. Francisco Valdes and Steven W. Bender offer a living example of how critical outsider academics can organize long-term collective action, both in law and society, that will help those similarly inclined to better organize themselves. Part roadmap, part historical record, and part a path forward, LatCrit: From Critical Legal Theory to Academic Activismshows that with coalition, collaboration, and community, social transformation can take root.