Throughout the past few decades, the U.S. media has portrayed the U.S.-Mexico border as a hub of illegality. The recent "War on Terror" has only magnified the angst surrounding the porosity of the U.S. border. Since 9/11, the media has become saturated with images of Mexican immigrants, crossing to the U.S. in "hordes," and Arabs as terrorists within the nation. These groups have been similarly rendered as an invading presence, and in the most extreme, as a threat to national security. This dissertation is therefore invested in tracing the genealogy of national hostility toward these targeted ethnic groups. The historical and racial convergence of Arabs and Mexicans first germinated in 15^th century Spanish Andalusia and flourished during the conquest of the New World. The conquistadors transferred the racial schema designed to marginalize the Moors in Spain to the colonies of New Spain, where it was implemented to render the indigenous population as "infidel," or "the new Moor." This racial schema laid the foundation for an institutionalized racism that reflects the current U.S. racial terrain.

In light of contemporary political debates encompassing immigration, particularly with the recent legislation aimed to eradicate "illegal" immigrants and eliminate Ethnic Studies curriculum in Arizona, this dissertation contextualizes its analysis of Arab American and Chicano literary production within a historical study of the marginalization of both Arab and Mexican Americans. This study investigates how Arab American and Chicano authors and performance artists, including Sandra Cisneros, Laila Halaby. Marian Haddad, Mohja Kahf, Gloria Anzaldúa, Culture Clash, and Ajyal, dismantle such crude historical depictions, and reimagine ethnic American subjectivities and histories. A goal of the dissertation is to situate Arab American and Chicano literary histories and criticisms in dialogue in order to examine how each field of study is formed and informed by the other, and to reveal the productive possibilities of cross-cultural communication. Therefore, this dissertation calls for a comparative Ethnic Studies, by examining the ways in which Arab American literature has initiated an interethnic dialogue with Chicano cultural production. While Chicano Studies in an established academic field that continues to evolve, Arab American Studies is an emerging discipline. This dissertation will contribute to the development of this field at its early formative stage. Given the declining interest in the Humanities due to economic adversity, this study seeks to reinvigorate the field of Ethnic Studies by opening it up to an interdisciplinary perspective, so that it may in turn foster new pedagogical approaches to literary studies.