Gender and Belonging: The Political Engagement of Mexican Migrant Leaders in Chicago

Abstract The article explores differences in the motivation for political engagement in a transnational context according to gender. The underlying ethnographic research reveals that the majority of Chicago’s Mexican migrant leaders – male and female – are simultaneously engaged in various political and civil society organisations; they are not only members of hometown associations and Mexican political parties, but also participate in nationwide US Latino organisations, immigrant organisations, human rights organisations and even in Mexican and US government institutions. In the article the political trajectories of four Mexican migrant leaders from Chicago are presented in short biographical portraits. The biographical approach shows the difference in life experience that formed these male and female leaders. For the men the motivation to become politically engaged is rooted in the sentiment of belonging to and being recognised in a community of origin. Therefore, male migrant leaders are deeply involve...