The news is filled with accounts of women and children from Central America arriving at the U.S. border and seeking asylum. While we are learning a great deal about their struggles once they arrive at the southern border, far less is known about their journey from Central America to the United States. Government statistics show that many women are migrating with their children, and the number of families apprehended at the border has increased in recent years. Many of these women rely on human smugglers to transport them and their children across Mexico to the U.S. border.
In this report, IIR affiliate Carol Cleaveland and her co-author Vicki Kirsch reveal the reality of human smuggling from the perspective of migrant women from Central America. Their testimony and experiences can teach us about the trauma they face during migration and how it continues to impact them when they arrive in the United States.
Read the report here.
This version is adapted from an article that appeared in Qualitative Social Work, April 2019.
July 24, 2019
