Gina Pérez is a cultural anthropologist and Professor and Chair of the Department of Comparative American Studies at Oberlin College.  In her talk, "Sanctuary and Accompaniment in Moments of Crisis", Pérez will explore how the idea and practice of sanctuary have a long and vexed presence in U.S. political discourse, community organizing and social movements.

This talk explores the ways activists, service providers, faith leaders and religious communities in Northeast Ohio draw on long histories of faith-based and secular organizing to mobilize and respond to immigrant precarity, especially among Latina/o communities in the state.  While sanctuary has become polarized word and practice, the idea of accompaniment, with roots in Latin American liberation struggles, increasingly circulates as both a political and religious practice as well as an act of solidarity.  What lessons do we learn about our current immigration enforcement crisis by centering sanctuary and accompaniment? Practices of sanctuary and accompaniment, Pérez argues, are grounded in local histories and attuned to national and transnational dynamics that offer valuable insight for those who seek to challenge anti-immigrant rhetoric and nurture the work of sanctuary people.

Pérez is the author of two award-winning books—The Near Northwest Side Story: Gender, Migration and Puerto Rican Families (2004, University of California Press) and Citizen, Student, Soldier: Latina/o Youth, JROTC and the American Dream  (2015, New York University Press). She is also the coeditor of two anthologies: Beyond el Barrio: Everyday Life in Latina/o America  (coedited with Frank Guridy and Adrian Burgos Jr., 2011, New York University Press) and Ethnographic Refusals, Unruly Latinidades (coedited with Alex Chávez, 2022, University of New Mexico Press, School for Advanced Research Advanced Seminar Series).

Her new book, Sanctuary People: Faith-Based Organizing in Latina/o Communities (NYU Press, 2024) explores how faith communities, local activists, and service providers in Ohio drew on the language and practice of sanctuary to characterize their responses to what felt like unrelenting instances of family separation, displacement, and increased economic and social vulnerability due to immigrant detention, (un)natural disasters, and economic and political crises within Latina/o communities from 2016-2020.

Dr. Perez will be in dialogue with Dr. Angela Garcia of Anthropology.

This event is co-sponsored by Chicana/o-Latina/o Studies, Anthropology, the Center for Latin American Studies and Religious Studies.