When I Wear My Alligator Boots: Narco-Culture in the US-Mexico Borderlands

by Shaylih Muehlmann

When I Wear My Alligator Boots examines how the lives of dispossessed men and women are affected by the rise of narcotrafficking along the U.S.-Mexico border. In particular, the book explores a crucial tension at the heart of the war on drugs: despite the violence and suffering brought on by drug cartels, for the rural poor in Mexico’s north, narcotrafficking offers one of the few paths to upward mobility and is a powerful source of cultural meanings and local prestige.

In the borderlands, traces of the drug trade are everywhere: from gang violence in cities to drug addiction in rural villages, from the vibrant folklore popularized in the narco-corridos of Norteña music to the icon of Jesús Malverde, the patron saint of narcos, tucked beneath the shirts of local people. In When I Wear My Alligator Boots, the author explores the everyday reality of the drug trade by living alongside its low-level workers, who live at the edges of the violence generated by the militarization of the war on drugs. Rather than telling the story of the powerful cartel leaders, the book focuses on the women who occasionally make their sandwiches, the low-level businessmen who launder their money, the addicts who consume their products, the mules who carry their money and drugs across borders, and the men and women who serve out prison sentences when their bosses' operations go awry.
 

Genres: Nonfiction, Anthropology, History, Politics, Ethnography

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Shaylih Muehlmann was born in the most densely populated region of Canada - southwestern Ontario. She comes from a family of songwriters, dogs, philosophers, teachers and poets. She “grew up” between stretches of life spent in Canada, rural Maine and the desert north of Mexico. Her first book "Where the River Ends" is about life at the end of the Colorado River, where the river no longer reaches the sea. Her second book "When I Wear My Alligator Boots" is about narco-culture in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands and the devastating affects of the “war on drugs.”

Shaylih holds a Canada Research Chair in Language, Culture and the Environment at the University of British Columbia and has won various awards for her work as an anthropologist including the 2009 University of California Press Public anthropology publishing Prize, the 2012 Ton Vallen Award and the 2012 Junior Scholar Award from the Anthropology and Environment Society.

Reviews

[Valeria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely gripping, insightful and courageous... The author does an outstanding job of detailing why the fight against drugs has failed miserably and should be approached from a public health standpoint. This book should be a primer for politicians and anyone working in the criminal justice field. Very insightful regarding the policies (NAFTA) and prohibitions of drugs and how they have contributed to the utter permeation of drug culture in Mexican society from the top down. A must read for anyone interested in how drug policy is shaping our society.

I, for one, am looking forward to other books written by this author.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a small publishing industry now in books on narcoculture. I don't intend to demean any of those efforts; many of those authors are not only cogent but courageous, given the number of Mexican reporters who have been assassinated. Shaylih Muehlmann set out to do something else, not to examine the capos or the police or even the musicians; she went to a fishing village in Sinaloa to examine how the narco-culture plays out at the local level. What she found there was every bit as sobering as the journalistic exposes or the biographies of capos, the histories of cartels. Some of what she found is discussed elsewhere, such as the sobering economic choice between the hard-work, low pay of fishing and the money and flash associated with working for the cartels. She notes that narco-culture itself is a style, one that meshes well into the long tradition of Mexican bravado and rebellion -- even if, she finds, that the alligator boots of the title have been replaced as the emblematic footwear of the narcos by tennis shoes. The association of beauty queens with narcos has been discussed in at least the Mexican forums, but Muehlmann's view is somewhat more nuanced. While she finds that women conceded the attraction of the narco's aura of power, she found that women often underplayed their family's role in the trade and frequently cited poverty as a cause. Muehlmann's research over the years allowed her to trace one informant's descent into meth hell, to the point that he is paid to be a watchman because he stays up all night; she also finds American meth-head expats, an exile that, predictably, one supposes, does not end well. She examines the role of one local middleman who in the style of the Michoacan cartels (La Familia, and the Knights Templar, named after the disgraced medieval order) speaks of religion and morals -- the latter principally directed at women, Muehlmann finds -- but also encourages people to open bank accounts so that he can use them to wash money. One shrewd woman actually tells Muehlmann that she convinced the preaching/banking narco to pay her for the use of her name on an account. Muehlmann's residence in Sinaloa coincided with the early part of the violent spiral; living among villagers in the home area of the most powerful cartel, she was spared the danger of contested areas like Acapulco, Juarez, and Northeast Mexico. By 2012, though, even she was frightened into staying away. Her account of these villagers captures their unschooled wit and thoughtfulness, their hard work, their hospitality and openness, the terrifying choices they have to make, and how deeply embedded the drug trade is into their environment. America has always liked to portray itself as the victim of unscrupulous drug smugglers and peddlers, and the recent violence has only sharpened that rhetoric. And, until the recent tragedy of the assassinated students in Iguala, (young men who aspired to be teachers, defied entrenched interests and paid for their ideals with their lives), it was possible for many inside Mexico to wish away the violence by claiming that the dead were only traffickers fighting it out among themselves. In that sense, Muehlmann also offers witness, less horrifying than the assassination of students but still wrenching, that the drug trade produces an unbearable cost on both sides of the border.

[Vivienne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an exceptional book. Well researched, beautifully written, and profoundly insightful. I think Muehlmann does an extraordinary job of highlighting the depth and complexity of each of the people she writes about, and this does an incredible job of illustrating the wider message of the complexities of the drug trade itself. I feel like ethnographies can be tricky, especially if being written by a (white, academic) outsider. Muehlmann seems consistently aware, though, of the limitations of her perspective and the ways in which her presence affects the situations she observes and seeks to research. Wow I loved this and learned SO dang much.

[Haleema Rabeea · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was reading this book as part of my degree in Global Public Health and Policy, I learnt so much from it! It allowed me to reflect on various important topics around drug policies, harm reduction, public health interventions and the wider socioeconomic factors. The book is very well written, Muehlmann uses “thick description” from her ethnographic work and analyses her descriptions of the characters succinctly and critically. I highly recommend this book!

[Tisbe Rinehart · Rating 4 out of 5]

really informative and well written ethnographic study of the cultural and political effect of the war on drugs in rural mexico. only thing is it got boring and wasn’t as informative as I would have liked.

[Justin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Insightful, engaging, well written

[Adriana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obligatory note: Got my copy thru First Reads.

An anthropological study, almost thesis-like in its construction, of the effect that the War on Drugs has on the poor of Mexico’s border cities and towns, this book was both an enlightening and a worrisome read.
The War on Drugs has been a much discussed topic for most of my life, a discussion and its importance that was exacerbated by Mexican President Calderon’s desire to end the war and the growing violence that resulted from it.
As I have the distinct insight of being both Mexican and a border resident, I found myself agreeing with much of the author’s insights. While I’ve been lucky enough to be far removed from almost all of the adverse effects, you can’t live in the area and not hear the stories.
This isn’t some sensationalist telling of the war. It’s a very intense and scholarly study that might be a little too dry for most people. There are very human stories, even a couple of laughs, but it reads like a very serious thesis project. If you aren’t a fan of foot notes, side notes, and further research, then this might not be a good book for you.
That said.
I’m glad the author did such a good job of showing the more human side of this war, the side of the unlucky “peons” that take all the risks for almost no rewards. It’s so easy to get caught up on the Big Bads, the ultra-violence, and the international problems, that the ones who truly suffer get lost in the shuffle and ignored.
Kudos to Muehlmann for being brave enough to do what she had to in order to get the complete picture.

[Janna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whether you’re well versed in drug culture narratives or interested in how NAFTA impacts drug trafficking, this is a compelling read. Muehlmann’s skill for framing critical social and economical issues on a human scale made it impossible for me to put this book down. The common thread running through each life is unmistakable and moving. It’s one thing to read statistics on how trafficking impacts our economy or culture; it’s something else to reflect on the everyday lives of rural people who depend on a narcotrafficking economy for their survival. The small details woven into the story of each life illuminate harsh realities and small acts of kindness.

[Edmund Catlin]

I was assigned this book in college and devoured it quicker than the course outlined. It showed that it is incredibly difficult to escape 'the system', whatever it may be. Is your beloved gramma part of the cartels? No. Is the cartel forcing her to help them by stashing packages in the cellar and making them sandwiches for their outings? Yes. Does she have a choice? No.

The part that has stuck with me the most was toward the end of the book - the profits from the illegal drug trade largely go to wall street, at least according to the UN. I wrote the author asking if there's more detail on this, to which she said no, sadly, there is not, particularly. The UN mentioned it briefly in the 90's and hasn't particularly circled back on it, a topic about which I'd read much more.

I thought this was a great book. Tying the macro to the micro - global politics to the smallest murmurs and feelings in one's soul - isn't easy, and Muehlmann handles it with fluency. Whether or not you're interested in the drug trade or border culture, you will learn about how human belonging works - something relevant to us all, whether or not you can claim it.

[Thomas Adrian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Get ready, because you are in for a ride. This book is a sobering revelation into the less obvious parts of the United States-Mexico war on drugs that many of us, fed with a steady diet of narcoculture, may not be aware of. Many of us easily caricature Mexico and the multiplicity of its drug-related problems without fully understanding the intricacies and prerequisite conditions that sustain them. I enjoyed the author’s clever use of ethnographic fieldnotes to encapsulate her findings. The writing style is also quite conversational as opposed to academic, which is perfect for me, and I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about the disturbing and least told truths about the war on drugs.

[Riley Harker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had to read this book for a class but I became very very interested in it as I read. It is such a detailed account of what narcotrafficking does to a community and I will never think of Mexico the same way after reading this. It has opened my eyes to a new perspective on life and the war on drugs which I have found to be fascinating.

[Sury · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting to read from the perspective of someone outside northern Mexican culture and asking questions about narco-corridos that I never thought would be important to study. Ethnographies I've read tend to be extremely wordy, and this was a pretty easy read, definitely catered for everyone and anyone.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book inspired me to pursue anthropology in my undergrad studies. The way Muehlmann writes is so accessible, yet still conveys insane depths of meaning and weight. I recommend this book to anyone and everyone. The stories of this field study are handled with so much care. This opened my eyes wider than any other research I've read this year. Truly amazing work.

[Soumaya elghoul · Rating 5 out of 5]

“He was already positioned in this economy on the wrong side of the border fence. For while Mexico exports the drugs and profits to the US, the US exports the guns, the bloodshed, and the blame to Mexico.”

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

read for anthro class - abt narco culture on the mexican american borderline

[Angie DePompeis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted to learn more about how narco culture affects the average Mexican citizen and decided to read this book. With the media, it’s hard to discern the effects of narco culture on the average person. Social media, songs, movies, TV shows, etc. glorify narco culture. After reading this book, I realized I made the right choice in picking this up.

I learned so much about how the narco culture impacts average people living in the US-Mexico borderlands. The stories of the people in this book are not glamorous. They are real and raw accounts from ordinary people living in this area. I’m so grateful that this author decided to give these people a voice. The author also includes a solution to this major problem but I’m not sure how much I agree with it. The legalization of drugs is a potential solution but it would be a tricky one undoubtedly.

Though this book is a bit outdated, majority of the information is still relevant. I hope other authors and researchers will follow in Muehlmann’s footsteps. I would love to read a non-fiction work similar to this one but written by a native of Mexico.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well-researched, yet still appropriately personal. Muehlmann is able to put a face to the real victims of the U.S. / Mexico War on Drugs, those left with little choice in the borderlands, caught between criminality or poverty, addiction, desolation.

[Stephanie McGarrah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good for introducing somebody to the politics and culture of the so-called drug war. Also, its excellent to read an explanation included of why people would rather risk their lives in the drug business than in the maquiladoras. Not sure if many get this.

As an ethnography it was a little too superficial of a treatment for what I was looking for, but I appreciated the stories.

[Anila · Rating 4 out of 5]

A required reading for my anthropology class turned into one of the most insightful books I've read in a while. Having actually met the author also made the read more worthwhile and personalized. This book is a richly telling account of how people in the grassroots of the US-Mexico borderlands are affected by narco-culture and the narco-economy. The long-lasting effects of NAFTA on the lives of the rural class and their need to find alternative careers in the narco-economy as a reaction to the failure of the legal economy are essentially what the book deals with. The heart-breaking effects are told through the fictionalized accounts of real people's experiences.

Highly recommended for anyone trying to understand how deeply the narco-economy has penetrated the smallest of villages and how it affects the base of society.