Congratulations to Kristina Fullerton Rico, who received a funded honorable mention for the Esther Ngan-ling Chow and Mareyjoyce Green dissertation scholarship from the Sociologists for Women in Society. The scholarship offers support to women and non-binary scholars of color who are from underrepresented groups and are studying concerns that women of color face domestically and/or internationally and increases the network and participation of students and professionals of color in SWS and beyond.
Kristina is a dissertator whose work is inspired, in part, by her own experiences as a Mexican immigrant with strong transnational bonds. Her binational, ethnographic research focuses on the experiences of unauthorized immigrants and their families who are physically divided –– due to the tightening Mexico–U.S. border –– but digitally close thanks to cheaper, more accessible communication technologies. Kristina’s Master’s thesis found that mothers with children on either side of the border use technology to forge bonds of “digital siblinghood” between siblings who have never met. By studying unauthorized migration using a transnational perspective, she hopes to help shift discourse from “right to stay” policy recommendations to arguing for the right to migrate more freely, a privilege that U.S. citizenship largely bestows.