Chapter 10: Border Inquiry

In her work, Gloria Anzaldúa (1987), a South Texas native, carefully describes what it means to live in a borderland. Her words acknowledge the space of constant transition embedded in daily life on the border. Together two federal laws, the Real ID Act of 2005 and the Secure Fence of 2006, make the construction of a fence along the U.S.–Mexico Border Fence possible. In 2008, I found out the Border Fence (Wall) will take up residents in South Texas. What I present in this chapter are the sights I witnessed in my immediate environment.

During the wall’s construction (2009–2010) I was living in a house less than a mile away from the wall. As I drove to classes each morning I watched as a path was cleared for the wall. I watched as the wall began to take shape. I watched as the wall was completed.