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Illegality and the Production of Affluence
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Over several decades, the influx of wealthy, white "lifestyle" migrants has transformed the economic, social, and ecological fabric of many rural communities across the United States—from alpine to...
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09 September 2025

Over several decades, the influx of wealthy, white "lifestyle" migrants has transformed the economic, social, and ecological fabric of many rural communities across the United States—from alpine towns of the Rockies to forest and lake communities of the Southeast—in a process akin to urban gentrification. Illegality and the Production of Affluence explores an underappreciated dimension of this process: its dependence on low-wage Latine immigrant workers, many undocumented, who build and maintain gentrified landscapes and lifestyles. Drawing on fine-grained qualitative data, Lise Nelson explores how employers recruited an unfamiliar workforce to places "off the map" of immigrant settlement. The book also reveals insights into how business practices and profitability shifted through the use of racialized, "illegal," and highly precarious labor. Finally, the book investigates the disjuncture between Latine immigrants' vital role in rural gentrifying economies and their social, civic, and racialized exclusion in the spaces of everyday life.
Price: $29.95
Pages: 248
Publisher: University of California Press
Imprint: University of California Press
Publication Date:
09 September 2025
Trim Size: 9.00 X 6.00 in
ISBN: 9780520416383
Format: Paperback
Lise Nelson is Professor in the School of Geography, Development, and Environment at the University of Arizona.
Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Note on Terminology
Introduction: Landscapes of Affluence, Geographies of Exclusion
1. Gentrification, Migration, and Race
2. Methods and Case Studies
3. Immigrant Labor Regimes
4. Social Reproduction, Race, and "Illegality"
Conclusion
Appendix: More on Methodology
List of Quoted Interviewees
Notes
References
Index
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Note on Terminology
Introduction: Landscapes of Affluence, Geographies of Exclusion
1. Gentrification, Migration, and Race
2. Methods and Case Studies
3. Immigrant Labor Regimes
4. Social Reproduction, Race, and "Illegality"
Conclusion
Appendix: More on Methodology
List of Quoted Interviewees
Notes
References
Index