Book Review: Gender Violence at The U.S.–Mexico Border: Media Representation and Public Response,

Abstract

Patricia Ravelo Blancas examines the subjectivities of the mothers of the murdered young women of Ciudad Juarez. Her focus is the transformative process by which individual loss can be re-signified through collective action. Many of those interviewed simply never imagined that the violence would happen to them and, amidst lives ‘of seemingly endless suffering’, they struggle with conflicting emotions of guilt and outrage (42). Drawing on ethnographer Roger D. Petersen’s work, the analysis skilfully charts the ways in which the experience of pain can sometimes lead to political consciousness and the will to fight against gender oppression.