

McGuinn 217
Telephone: 617-552-1605
Email: alejandro.olayomendez@bc.edu
Migration, Refugees, and Humanitarian Interventions
Alejandro Olayo-Méndez is an assistant professor at the Boston College School of Social Work. His research focuses on migrants’ and refugees’ livelihoods and the role of humanitarian organizations in contexts of migration and forced displacement.  He has conducted extensive ethnographic research along migration routes in Mexico. His book  by NYU Press explores how casas de migrantes or migrant shelters shape the migratory processes in the region. In recent years,  he has travelled widely across the Mexico-U.S. Border studying migrants’ digital practices, the impact of the CBP One™  app, and migrants’ well-being. He published part of his findings in the report——in collaboration with Jesuit Refugee Service/USA. Additionally, he wrote an article discussing the experience of Latino immigrants in the United States during the pandemic. He led a research project with the Jesuit Network with Migrants (Latin America and the Caribbean), which examines integration practices and accompaniment of refugees and migrants in 14 countries and their lived experiences in those countries. Alejandro is also a Jesuit Catholic Priest.
ARTICLES
Diamond, M. B., Testa, L., Novak, C., Kempton-Amaral, K., Porteny, T., and Olayo-Méndez, A., (2020). A Population in Peril: A Health Crisis among Asylum Seekers on the Northern Border of Mexico. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Global Health Institute. Available from globalhealth.harvard.edu
Olayo-Méndez, A (2017). La 72: An Oasis along the Migration Routes in Mexico, Forced Migration Review, 56, 10-11
Olayo-Méndez, A (2017). ‘Programa de la Frontera Sur’ and Interdiction, Peace Review, 29(1), 24-30
Olayo-Méndez, A., Haymes, S. N., & Vidal de Haymes, M. (2014). Mexican Migration-Corridor Hospitality, Peace Review, 26(2), 209-217
Olayo Méndez, J. A. (2006). Latino Parenting Expectations and Styles: A Literature Review, Protecting Children, 21(2), 53−61
CONTRIBUTIONS TO EDITED VOLUMES
Kubal, A. and Olayo-Méndez, A. (Forthcoming). Mirrors of Justice? Undocumented Immigrants in Courts in the United States and Russia, in R. Koulish & V. D. W. Maartje (eds.) Trump, Brexit and Fortress Europe. New York, Fordham University Press
Olayo-Méndez, A. (2019). The US-Mexico Border: More than a Political Line, in A. Ares, M. GarcÃa Durán, J. Iglesias, C. Estrada Villaseñor (eds.) Migratory Flows at The Borders of Our World, Bogota, Universidad Javeriana.
Olayo-Méndez, A. (2019). La Esperanza: Una CategorÃa Teológica para Acercarse a la Migración, in A. Carpio Pérez and Y.B. SolÃs Nicot (eds.) Migración y Religión, Ciudad de México, Universidad Iberoamericana.
Alejandro has done clinical work with migrant women in Chicago, IL, and was a school social worker at Gonzaga Preparatory School in Spokane, WA.