El derecho a no migrar : Mexico’s colonialism and the forced displacement of the Ñuu Savi

The emergent field of Mexican indigenous migration studies has focused on remittances, hometown associations, cultural reproduction, and identity formation in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. In my project, I contribute to the work of indigenous migration studies by analyzing and contesting the Mexican Nation’s State hegemony. Mexico’s political and economic structures have systematically caused the forced displacement of Ñuu Savi (Mixtec) people from their land in Oaxaca, Mexico. Through a historical analysis, I explore the Porfirian period (1876-1910), as it instigated land dispossession, initiated government projects against indigenous communities, and forced indigenous people to become laborers for hacienda plantations. Then, I examine the agrarian reform government initiatives of 1915 and their implementation during the Lázaro Cárdenas Administration (1934-1940). Drawing from literature reviews and policy analysis, I contend that indigenous people from Mexico now living in the United States were forced to out-migrate because of Mexico’s colonial, racial, and ethnic policies towards indigenous people, policies that negated their right not to migrate.