Tex-Mex is not Texas, not Mexico

That American and Mexican cultures are distinct and dissimilar is a view shared by both Mexicans and Americans. This view ignores the history of a large portion of the southern United States or interprets that history in a way that alienates the parts of the United States originally settled by Spain from the rest of the country. This view ignores the stark reality of life in the border area; communities along both sides of the border may have more in common with each other than with their respective neighbors in the interior. Harsh border policies that do not acknowledge the human and physical geography of the border region are unlikely to succeed.

Perhaps that’s stating to obvious to people who read this site, but in a nutshell, that’s a big reason the proposed border fence is regarded down here as totally nuts. I was looking for something else entirely, and ran across the quote on a legal scholarship blog. It’s from the abstract to an academic paper (M. Isabel Medina, At the Border: What Tres Mujeres Tell Us About Walls and Fences, Journal of Gender, Race & Justice, Vol. 10, p. 245, 2007), downloadable here.