Alejandro M. Marquez

Interests

Political Sociology, Social Movements, Labor, Emotions, Immigration, Social Theory

Biography

Alejandro Márquez is a PhD student at the University of Texas at Austin. He previously completed a Masters of Arts in Latin American Studies (LLILAS) and a Masters in Global Policy Studies (LBJ School) at UT Austin. His research interests include social movements, labor, emotions, immigration, and social theory. Particularly, he is interested in the role of labor and emotions in transnational social movements.   

He is currently conducting an investigation on the solidarity movement assisting immigrants in El Paso, Texas. This project seeks to understand the role of emotions in the labor conducted in the solidarity movement. A significant aspect of participation in the movement involves care work and exploring how it is conducted will help understand the motivations, meanings, and ideas motivating action to help others and, in turn, how these factors are affected by action. This project also seeks to clarify what solidarity with others looks like and what it means for movement participants. He hopes to draw conclusions on the forms best suited for the construction of solidarity. 

For his Masters project, Alejandro studied the emotional and cultural dimension of work in maquiladora plants in Northern Mexico. This work looked at the how conflicts in the maquiladoras are dealt with at the managerial level to maintain production going in a context of mininal labor organization.