Temporalities of migration in Roberto Lovato’s memoir Unforgetting: A Memoir of Family, Migration, Gangs, and Revolution in the Americas and Jose Antonio Vargas’s Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen

Time in autobiographical writing is central for the construction of the self and a cohesive identity. The autobiographical text balances between being geared towards the future despite its preoccupation with the past, while written from a present perspective relating to the time of writing. Experiences of migration introduce yet another dimension, as migration is movement in both place and time. This article examines two autobiographical texts that address the relationship between self and time in connection with migration: Roberto Lovato’s memoir Unforgetting: A Memoir of Family, Migration, Gangs, and Revolution in the Americas and Jose Antonio Vargas’s Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen . Vargas’s experience of being undocumented in the United States causes temporal limbo, whereas Lovato sets out to uncover personal family history as it intertwines with El Salvador’s past. Both authors also advocate for change with regard to migration and how particularly those without papers are treated. The memoirs perform work for the future, envisioning social transformation and connecting it to the authors pasts. The narrated selves build on the temporalities of remembering and reconstructing the past and of an activist present.