Space invaders in US immigration courts: Reflections on embodiment, complicities, and the possibility and limits of resistance

Nirmal Puwar’s Space Invaders: Race, Gender and Bodies out of Place is a classic treatise on embodiment and institutions, in which the author explicates the white masculinist somatic norm of most political and professional institutions in the West, the long histories of imperialism that led to such a norm and the experiences of racialized and gendered people in these spaces. I reflect on how taking seriously Puwar’s invitation for reflexivity in Space Invaders and being attentive to aspects of embodiment, such as dress, speech, comportment, et cetera, is crucial for scholars studying institutions related to immigration in the US empire-state. My experiences of conducting 2 years of ethnography at the US immigration court in Boston brought into sharp relief my own ontological complicities with academia and the empire, while at the same time teaching me to strategically deploy my insider habits of speech, expressions, and clothing to intervene on behalf of immigrant respondents who were systematically intimidated and silenced. While these interventions were not enough to dismantle or transform the institution, it brought those immigrants temporary relief and comfort and further cemented my relationship of solidarity with them. As Trump promises to deport more immigrants than ever in his current term as President, heeding Puwar’s call to be mindful of our own and our research subjects’ embodiment, complicities and strategies for resistance has become all the more important and can only enrich future research on immigration.