Impossible Subjects - (Politics and Society in Modern America) by Mae M Ngai (Paperback)

Impossible Subjects: How the Illegal Alien Became a Legal Problem by Mae Ngai is an essential read for anyone interested in understanding the complex history of immigration policy in the United States.

This book provides a comprehensive and nuanced analysis of how the term "illegal alien" came to be, and how it has shaped ideas and practices about citizenship, race, and state authority.

Through a close reading of legal regime of restriction that commenced in the 1920s, Ngai reveals how immigration restriction remapped America by creating new categories of racial difference and emphasizing as never before the nation's contiguous land borders and their patrol.

With a focus on the bureaucratic and ideological machinery within legislatures and the courts that has created a very particular kind of pariah group, Ngai's book is both judicious yet impassioned, crisply written, eye-opening, and at moments fully devastating.

Don't miss out on this brilliant contribution to the field of immigration studies!