Dartmouth Events

Sanctuary Everywhere

Sanctuary is often imagined as a singular place where people at risk of deportation seek protection. Instead, Barbara Sostaita turns to the Sonoran Desert to consider how sanctuary travels with migrants, artists, and activists as they cross and transgress borders. In this talk, she turns to scenes from her fieldwork with a deported nurse who operates a "sanctuary on wheels" and an artist mourning the migrant dead to consider how sanctuary as a sacred practice refuses stasis and permanence, opting instead to pursue flight and fugitivity.”

Barbara Sostaita is a formerly undocumented writer and scholar of migration and religion. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor in Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of Illinois Chicago. Her book, Sanctuary Everywhere: The Fugitive Sacred in the Sonoran Desert, documents moments of care and intimacy on the migrant trail. Her work broadly traces the ways artists, activists, and migrants engage with the sacred to cross and transgress borders.

Please RSVP by February 19, 2025.