Event Description
Over the past two decades, immigration policy debates have largely shifted away from concerns about who can enter the United States to focus instead on how we regulate immigrants who are already here. Anti-immigrant rhetoric frequently invokes racist, sexist, homophobic and Christian fundamentalist imagery to suggest that recent immigrants are a bad fit for the United States. Meanwhile, immigrants’ rights advocates assert that the stereotypes lurking beneath current immigration law and policy ignore the incredible diversity of immigrant America. At the core of both groups’ advocacy, though generally unspoken, are deeply-held convictions about the identity of America itself.
Cosponsors
Co-sponsored by the Asian American Law Journal; the Berkeley Journal of African-American Law & Policy; the Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law and Justice; the Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern & Islamic Law; the Berkeley La Raza Law Journal; the California Law Review; and the Center for Latin American Studies.
Schedule
Thursday, February 24, 3:30 pm (Boalt 105)
“Law and Memory: What Asian American Jurisprudence Reminds Us About Citizenship, Immigration & Identity”
Assistant Professor Rose Cuison Villazor, Hofstra Law
Monday, February 28, 12:45 pm (Boalt 105)
“Setting the Stage: The History and Trajectory of Immigration Law”
Professors Leti Volpp and Sarah Song, Berkeley Law
Tuesday, March 1, 12:45 pm (Boalt 105)
“Ordinary Guys: Why Integrating Immigrants Won’t Prevent Terrorism”
Betsy Cooper, Yale Law School
Wednesday, March 2, 12:45 pm (Boalt 105)
“Not Fitting the Mold: Barriers to Asylum for LGBT Refugees”
Kim Thuy Seelinger, UC Berkeley Human Rights Center
Neil Grungras, Organization for Refuge Asylum and Migration International
Jeffrey Martins, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Asylum Pro-Bono Project
Thursday, March 3 (Goldberg Room, Boalt Hall)
11:15 am
“Vulnerable Populations in Immigration Detention”
Moderator: Laurel Anderson (’11), Berkeley Law
Kyra Lilien (’06), Centro Legal de la Raza
Raha Jorjani, UC Davis Immigration Clinic
Jennifer Stark, ACLU of Southern California
Hayley Upshaw, National Center for Youth Law
12:45 pm
“Political Organizing for Immigrants’ Rights: Attorneys as Allies in Grassroots
Movements”*
Moderator: Karen Tumlin (’04), National Immigration Law Center
Gisella Ramirez, Border Action Network
Renee Saucedo (’90), La Raza Centro Legal
Luís Perez, DREAM Activist (UCLA)
Lizbeth Mateo, DREAM Activist
* in coordination with the Hon. Thelton E. Henderson Center for Social Justice
2:00 – 3:30 pm
“Closing Remarks & Reception”
Professor Stephen Lee, UC Irvine School of Law