Dreamers Refuse To Be Victims

Upheaval. Flight. Terror. Insecurity. Milan Voticky and his family faced all of this when the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939 forced them to escape to Shanghai. Liberated from the Shanghai ghetto in 1945, the Voticky family made their way back to Prague, only to find themselves fleeing Czechoslovakia once again — this time from the Communists. When they finally found permanent refuge as in Canada, Milan swore that would refuse to see himself as a victim. He would seize every possible opportunity. In this, he finds common cause with the Dreamers, the 1,800,000 undocumented children of illegal immigrants in the USA who are covered by DACA. “As a two-time refugee from oppression and death,” Voticky writes, “I can understand the Dreamers’ fear of being sent to a country and culture that they don’t know or understand, where the language is one they do not speak, where they have no family or friends.” In addition to being the remarkable story of a remarkable man, Dreamers Refuse to Be Victims is a call to all those fleeing injustice to take charge of their own futures.

Upheaval. Flight. Terror. Insecurity. Milan Voticky and his family faced all of this when the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939 forced them to escape to Shanghai. Liberated from the Shanghai ghetto in 1945, the Voticky family made their way back to Prague, only to find themselves fleeing Czechoslovakia once again — this time from the Communists. When they finally found permanent refuge as in Canada, Milan swore that would refuse to see himself as a victim. He would seize every possible opportunity. In this, he finds common cause with the Dreamers, the 1,800,000 undocumented children of illegal immigrants in the USA who are covered by DACA. “As a two-time refugee from oppression and death,” Voticky writes, “I can understand the Dreamers’ fear of being sent to a country and culture that they don’t know or understand, where the language is one they do not speak, where they have no family or friends.” In addition to being the remarkable story of a remarkable man, Dreamers Refuse to Be Victims is a call to all those fleeing injustice to take charge of their own futures.

Based on extensive field research, the essays in this volume illuminate the experiences of migrants from their own point of view, providing a critical understanding of the complex social reality in which each experience is grounded. Access to medical care for migrants is a fundamental right which is often ignored. The book provides a critical understanding of the social reality in which social inequalities are grounded and offers the opportunity to show that right to health does not correspond uniquely with access to healthcare.

This open access short reader provides an introduction to the theoretical debates regarding irregular migration and aims to bridge these theoretical debates to current empirical developments. It defines irregular migrants and irregular migration by discussing the wide variety of definitions and highlights the reasons for the presence of irregular immigrants in developed countries. The book provides an overview of the variation in policies regarding irregular migrants and elaborates on how irregular migration is facilitated and supported. It discusses the trends and dynamics between border enforcement, human smuggling/trafficking, and on the support irregular migrants obtain by citizens and civil society while residing in the EU. Last but not least, the book also focuses on the agency and political mobilization of irregular migrants. As such, it provides a great resource for everyone interested in learning more about irregular migration.

Sophie Chao examines the multispecies entanglements of oil palm plantations in West Papua, Indonesia, showing how Indigenous Marind communities understand and navigate the social, political, and environmental demands of the oil palm plant.

Through case studies of prominent cultural products, this book takes a longitudinal approach to the influence and conceptualization of the Civil War in democratic Spain. Stafford explores the stories told about the war during the transition to democracy and how these narratives have morphed in light of the polemics about historical memory.