Dr Alejandra Diaz De Leon
-
Email
alejandra.diazdeleon@essex.ac.uk -
Telephone
+44 (0) 1206 873054
-
Location
5A.327, Colchester Campus
Profile
Biography
I am a qualitative researcher of undocumented migration. I do ethnography, qualitative interviews, and participant observation in Mexico and the United States. I have two main research interests. The first one is transit migration, violence and trust. I study ethnographically how Central American migrants in transit through Mexico form trust and bonds among themselves in order to survive and help each other. I have recently published a book on this subject. I am also researching how humanitarian actors and migrants understand the climate crisis as a reason for leaving their home countries. This will be a three year project where, with a team, we will do fieldwork in migrant houses along the migrant route in Mexico interviewing migrants, activists, and stakeholders.
Qualifications
-
PhD University of Essex,
Research and professional activities
Research interests
Migration, solidarity and trust
I study how migrants in transit form social ties while they are crossing the unpredictable and dangerous migrant route.
Migration and the climate crisis
I study how migrants from Central America interpret the climate crisis as a reason for leaving their home countries.
Human Rights
Latin America
Teaching and supervision
Current teaching responsibilities
-
Childhood Innocence and Deviance (SC311)
-
Introduction to Crime, Law and Society (SC104)
-
Global Security Challenges (SC561)
Publications
Journal articles (7)
Eguiluz, I., Díaz de León, A., González Zepeda, CA. and Trejo Peña, AP., Repensar, reinventar y reflexionar la investigación cualitativa en tiempos de covid-19: el caso de los estudios migratorios. Caleidoscopio - Revista Semestral de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades
Díaz de León, A., Why do you trust him? The construction of the good migrant in the Mexican migrant route. European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies. 0 (111), 1-1
Díaz de León, A., (2024). Family dynamics, violence and transit migration through Mexico. Third World Quarterly. 45 (5), 888-902
Doering-White, J., Diaz De Leon, A., Batista, CA. and Flynn, K., (2024). Humanitarian aid and the everyday invisibility of climate-related migration from Central America. Climate and Development, 1-8
Díaz de León, A., (2023). Resignation and Resistance: How do Undocumented Central American Migrants View Detention in Mexico? = Resignación y resistencia: ¿cómo perciben las personas migrantes centroamericanas la detención migratoria en México?. Journal of Latin American Geography. 22 (1), 11-30
Díaz de León, A., (2022). “Transient Communities”: How Central American Transit Migrants form Solidarity Without Trust. Journal of Borderlands Studies. 37 (5), 897-914
Díaz de León, A. and Yrizar Barbosa, G., (2021). Diseño de investigación-acción participativa: ethos en espacios de ayuda a migrantes en México. Estudios Sociológicos de El Colegio de México. 39 (116), 599-614
Books (1)
Díaz de León, A., (2023). Walking Together Central Americans and Transit Migration Through Mexico. University of Arizona Press. 0816546479. 9780816546473
Book chapters (1)
Díaz de León, A. and Doering-White, J., (2024). Ties along the arterial border in Mexico. In: Forced Migration across Mexico. Routledge. 128- 142
