Cool Class: Immigrant Policy, Infrastructure and Organizing in New Jersey

Graduate research seminar
Mondays from 12:30 to 3:10pm
790:559 Metropolitan Politics: Immigrant Policy, Infrastructure and Organizing in New Jersey

Professor Ulla Berg, Dept. of Anthropology and Hispanic Caribbean and Latino Studies
Professor Christine Brenner, Public Policy and Admin. (Camden)
Professor James DeFilippis, Bloustein School
Professor Janice Fine, School of Management and Labor Relations and Eagleton Institute
Professor Kathe Newman, Bloustein School
Professor Robyn Rodriguez, Dept. of Sociology
Professor Mara Sidney, Dept. of Politics (Newark)
Professor David Tulloch, Center for Remote Sensing and Spatial Analysis
Instructor: Dr. Anastasia Mann, Eagleton Institute

More than ever, community-based organizations across New Jersey play critical roles in the economic, social and political incorporation of immigrants. In this course, faculty from across the social sciences will lead students on an exploration of the role of community-based organizations in the lives of New Jersey’s 21st century immigrants.

Students will examine how diverse networks of immigrants have established and adapted a host of community-based organizations as a means to build lives and gain power. From soccer leagues and daycare centers to small business associations and worker centers, immigrants create and rely on CBOs to meet all kinds of needs. On the streets of Newark, on farms across Atlantic County, and in the many mid-sized cities in between, immigrants connect to the state, to native-born residents and to each other through the mechanism of CBOs.

Students will explore:

• Who are today’s low-wage immigrants and why do they come?
• How have larger scale changes such as globalization and the domestic devolution of the welfare state from the federal level impacted immigration patterns and immigrant experiences at the local level?
• What are the empirical trends and theoretical frameworks through which we can understand patterns of immigration over time?
• What critical employment and labor rights affecting immigrant workers?
• What impact is the recession having in communities and on the infrastructure?

Students will conduct independent research with Rutgers Immigrant Infrastructure Map, a new multi-faculty research initiative out of the Eagleton Institute, testing original hypotheses about the (still largely unexplored) statewide immigrant infrastructure.

The map above shows 2000 US Census responses of non-native born residents as a percent of the population (Dark is high and light colored is low).

NOTE: Readers will want to note that my in-class presence will be moderated by a double class conflict. If you are looking to maximize contact time you should talk to me directly.