Framing U.S.-Mexican Borderlands: Phillip Rodriguez’ Visual Aesthetics

The U.S.-Mexican border towns are often defined as both multicultural and relatively young transnational cities, which, despite their common historical past, grew somehow apart because of their administration. The increasing border policy, which actually started during Eisenhower’s administration, seems to favor further differences. Border towns now seem to change more drastically, as well as the identity (construction) of its inhabitants, whether they are in passing or not. The present article will analyze how documentary filmmaker Phillip Rodriguez translates urban imaginary and ethnographic shifts to the screen, in particular in 'Mixed Feelings: San Diego/Tijuana' (2002) and 'Los Angeles Now' (2003). In the documentary, close attention will be paid to the multimodal strategies and other discursive practices, as well as to the dominant use of the American language and the somehow biased focus on the social actors involved in the border zone. We claim that, in his portrayal of border towns, documentary filmmaker Rodriguez invites his audience to rethink border towns from a mainly northern perspective and professes to represent multilayered and connected worlds, while visualizing dual and divided spaces which leave little room to the “border struggles” taking place along and on the border (Mezzadra & Nielson 2013: 3). We raise the question to which extent his documentary discourse on border towns does enrich the larger socio-cultural polysystem in terms of transmission of knowledge and affects related to living experiences in urban borderlands.

Publication year:2020

Accessibility:Open