MESA Banner
Policing One's Own: Syrian Interpreters at the US Mexico Borderlands 1900-1924
Abstract
In 1912, Heleney Attal sent for her sister in Tyre to join her in El Paso and work at the general store she co-owned with her business partner Michel Simaan. Her sister, Cecilia, had been recently widowed and needed income to support her children. When she arrived at the border, however, she was refused entry because Heleney’s business partner was a married man. Convinced that Heleney was employed in sex work, the immigrant inspectors at the border would not allow Cecilia to cross, believing she would also become a sex worker. The reasoning behind the belief, however, did not come from the anglo US inspectors: it came from the Syrian interpreter who had a business grudge against Simaan. Using the experiences of Cecilia and Heleney Attal as well as other women crossing the US-Mexico border, I focus my paper on Syrian interpreters and their role in policing Syrian mobility. Poorly paid and often not fluent in English, the interpreters were both part of the Syrian communities that straddled the US-Mexico border, and also active in policing them. Piecing together border reports, newspapers, and government investigations found in the US National Archives, I discuss the ways that Syrian interpreters aligned with classed and patriarchal power in the United States and the Syrian diaspora to further their own positions. My paper opens up discussions on transnational patriarchy, the intersections of class and race, and the intimate nature of migrant policing.
Discipline
History
Geographic Area
Lebanon
Sub Area
Diaspora/Refugee Studies