There's No Jose Here: Following the Hidden Lives of Mexican Immigrants

by Gabriel Thompson

Mexican immigration has become one of the most polarizing issues and will remain a central issue in the coming years. Once Mexicans had a sizable presence in a few select states like California, Texas, Arizona and New York; today the fastest growing populations are in places like North Carolina, Arkansas, Georgia and Tennessee.. What motivates people to risk their very lives, and why don't Mexicans just "play by the rules" and enter legally? How do they cope, living in a strange country among people that speak a language they can't understand? And after everything they have gone through, do they see immigration as a blessing, a curse, or something in between? There's No Jose Here allows Mexicans in the U.S. to speak in their own words. The central narrative follows Enrique, a 34-year-old livery cab driver who came to the US illegally at the age of 16 and has since seen his daughter lead poisoned, his mother abandoned in Mexico by his father, his cousin murdered on the streets of Brooklyn, and his best friend deployed to Iraq. This book gives readers a look into these stories as people struggle to survive in a new and often hostile land.

Genres: Nonfiction, Anthropology, History

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

I have spent most of the past decade working as an independent journalist, writing feature articles about immigration, labor, and organizing for a variety of publications that include the New York Times, Harper’s, Slate, Virginia Quarterly Review, New York, Mother Jones, and The Nation. Most of my magazine writing can be found at https://gabrielthompson.org/

I'm the author of four books, each with deal in some way with the same themes. My newest, out in March 2016, is America's Social Arsonist: Fred Ross and Grassroots Organizing in the Twentieth Century. The book is the first biography of one of the most influential--but little known--community organizers in American history, who mentored both Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta.

I'm currently a Steinbeck Fellow at San Jose State University.

Reviews

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good work of journalistic nonfiction, one of those books where the author gets to know some people with difficult life circumstances and writes about their lives. The central figure is Enrique, a larger-than-life New York City cabbie who immigrated from Mexico as a teenager, and whom the author initially met through community organizing around lead paint in low-income housing. Enrique has little education but a lot of savvy, and some strong opinions about community solidarity that, along with one of his own children suffering from lead paint poisoning, lead him to be deeply invested in the work. (I think community organizing types would appreciate this book a lot.) But while the book begins with a focus on NYC housing troubles, it expands to follow the lives of Enrique and some friends and relatives, and culminates in the author accompanying Enrique and a few family members back for a visit to his mom in Mexico, and learning more about the place he came from.

Overall, a well-written book with engaging storytelling, and sympathy and respect for its subjects, without brushing their flaws under the rug. The author writes about wanting to counter stereotypical notions of immigrants (as criminals on the one hand, or victims lacking agency of their own on the other), which he does quite successfully in his portrayal of Enrique. Perhaps appropriately for the readership likely to actually pick up this book, I think it does more to counter the stereotypes on the left than the right: Enrique and his family constantly struggle with poverty and poor housing conditions, but without just waiting around for someone else to solve their problems (at one point he renovates the whole dump of an apartment by himself). On the other hand, I suspect readers looking for confirmation of anti-immigrant prejudices would just see what they’re looking for, for instance in Enrique’s lying himself into a green card—but then, it’s perhaps unrealistic to expect a book to change the mind of someone who actively opposes changing it.

And I think those who come into the book wanting to learn more without expecting those featured in it to be representative of all immigrants would find it an excellent read. It touches on themes important to many: the difficulty of crossing the border and the reasons people do it anyway; domestic violence and differences between norms in Mexico and the U.S.; the effect of large-scale emigration on Mexican towns; the difference between immigrants’ plans when they first arrive and once they’ve been in the U.S. for awhile; the challenge of parenting for people who weren’t parented much themselves; divisions between first-generation immigrants and their American-born children; and more. All of it through the stories of people the author meets rather than the author’s trying to push preconceived ideas on the reader.

I feel a bit guilty liking books like this, written by an outsider about a marginalized community. (This book is very similar to On the Rez, except that one’s set on a South Dakota reservation.) But it’s a good book, and outsider journalism, insider journalism, and memoirs each have their strengths and weaknesses; I think there’s a lot to be said for reading all of these for those who want to learn more about the world. This particular book isn’t mindblowing, but it’s quite good and despite being published in 2006 and based on events taking place from 2002-05, still feels very timely in 2021.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the best non-fiction books I have ever read. It's well written and engaging, and doesn't hit you over the head with dogma. Although this book sometimes discusses immigration issues on a general level, it isn't really a book about "immigration issues". It's the story of one specific person and his struggle to make a life for himself and his family (but it's not as sappy as that last sentence might make it sound!). Gabriel Thompson does a fantastic job of keeping the story objective and balanced and neither deifying or vilifying the people he's writing about, presenting them as real human beings with both good and bad aspects to who they are and what motivates them. If you have any interest at all in learning more about what it is really like to come to the United States as an illegal immigrant, then you should definitely read this book.

[Karin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pick pick pick. The only times I put this book down was to sleep and go to my workout class. Think this book is too old to be relevant? Think again. It's more timely than ever. Thompson tells the story of his friends he meets while working for housing justice, and the challenges that both documented and undocumented Mexicans face. They also travel to Mexico in the second half to get the perspective of family members living there.

[Christy · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting book about one Mexican immigrant family. I enjoyed it very much and found it to be relevant to my own life, especially here in Durham which is absolutely full of undocumented workers.

[Elyse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing story of a very charming Mexican immigrant and his family. Really captures all sides of the immigration debate with a lot of color and humor, Enrique is a character I only wish I could meet in real life.

[René Fabian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I never expected to like this book as much as I did. The author does a good job of describing the Mexican families depicted in this book. He follows their lives from where they are living to where they work and ultimately where their families live in Mexico. The living conditions in New York are eye opening as well as the politics that surround those living in similar housing. It is a humanitarian look into working people and how they live. The 2nd part of the book is about their trip to Mexico and what it means for the families left behind. Much of the progress made in subpar countries is a result of money sent from the US. Even though wages are lower for those that are undocumented, they still fare somewhat better here in the US. Of course, the better question to ask is: is it worth it to have meager living conditions in the US and live thousands of miles from loved ones or is it better to live in a country where violence(in some situations) is the norm, having little to no work or food but live together as a family? The answer to this question is as complicated as trying to find solutions to immigration and border control.

In a time when immigration is a hot button topic, this book is a reminder of how unfair immigrants are treated in this country where their best asset is their cheap labor all while trying to subdue their progress or simply pretend that they do not exist.

[Thekla M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Richly educational

Loved how dedicated to Mexican culture Thompson was to research and write this book. His perspective was fluid and unbiased, his writing simple, c!ear, transparent. I embraced the cultural education. Great book.

[Ushan · Rating 4 out of 5]

After he graduated from college in 2001, Gabriel Thompson worked for four years as a community organizer in New York for a nonprofit organization which, if I understood it correctly, gives legal aid to tenants in conflict with their landlords, and lobbies for laws on their behalf; when a politician named Miller held a fundraiser, it organized a protest outside with a chant in Spanish, "¡Miller, racista, te tenemos en la lista!" (Miller, the racist, we have you on the list!). In a Mexican restaurant, Thompson ran into a man who was having trouble with his landlord, told him about his organization, and befriended him. This man is a legal immigrant from Mexico; although he came illegally, he got his employer to lie in the letter of reference, and so got legalized under the 1986 amnesty law. He hails from a village in South-East Mexico; the youngest child of eight, he only has a primary education because the village did not have a high school; later it is revealed that of the eight siblings, six live in the United States, one in Mexico City, and one stayed in the village with their mother. He worked as a cab driver very hard, for very low money; his common-law wife, who is in the country illegally, also worked very hard as a seamstress for a fraction of the minimum wage. At the beginning of the book, they had one small child together, and each had children from a previous relationship, the woman a son and two daughters and the man a daughter; later the woman has another baby. Because they had so little money, they could only afford to live in a half-abandoned building that had problems with hot water, sewage and pests; all through the book they fight with different landlords, and later move out to Westchester County. When the cab driver's daughter was a toddler, she got lead poisoning from eating chips of old lead paint; the nonprofit got him to speak before politicians, which helped pass the 2004 New York City law on lead paint, which is tougher on the landlords than the previous law. At age 14 this daughter got pregnant, and dropped out of high school. At the same age the cab driver's stepson started working off the books at a car wash; it was too hard to study and work at the same time, so eventually he dropped out, too. In the second part of the book, the cab driver, the stepson and other relatives come to the cab driver's home village in Mexico, which has two sources of income: subsistence agriculture, and remittances from the United States; they take Thompson along. The cab driver shows him the landmarks of his childhood, and tells him that he will never go back permanently; even squalor in Brooklyn is preferable to rural poverty in South-East Mexico.

In the introductory chapter Thompson says that he wrote this book in order to humanize the immigration debate of the late 2000s, and to combat "abstractions and generalizations" about immigrants. However, I think that his book unintentionally confirms some of them. One of the generalizations he set out to combat was that the Mexicans came to the United States to get welfare. The cab driver and the seamstress didn't, but the seamstress's two daughters dropped out of high school, settled with their boyfriends and were in fact on welfare (though one of them is later mentioned as having a business importing unspecified goods from Mexico). Another was that immigrants stole jobs from U.S. citizens. The cab driver's stepson worked at a car wash off the books alongside illegal immigrants who received less than the minimum wage; presumably, if they weren't there, the owners would have to employ citizens or legal residents for the minimum wage or more. Another is that they are violent. Well, the cab driver's cousin was murdered by an illegal immigrant. However, to Thompson's credit, he tells the story of the cab driver and his family truthfully, and does not whitewash the facts that contradict his theses.

[Jennie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kind of two books in one: a good solid look at the difficulties faced by Mexican immigrants in New York (those who came legally and those who didn't), and a fascinating picture of their families' lives in rural Mexico. It's not a polemic, just a story about people. Definitely recommend.

[Shane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick and enjoyable read. I preferred Sam Quinones' two books which explore similar issues.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Welcome to America. I highly recommend this book for anyone wanting to know more about (latino) immigrant life in America.

[Desiree · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting if not totally surprising.