In this episode, social anthropologist Luis Alfredo Briceño González talks about his experiences as a foreign researcher in Chile. During his fieldwork, he met Marta, a Venezuelan woman residing in an informal settlement on the outskirts of Santiago. Marta and her family held a mock election to protest not being able to vote in their home country during the presidential elections in 2024. Through her story, Luis discusses the enduring emotional and political ties that migrants often have with their home countries.

Luis Alfredo Briceño González is a doctoral candidate at the Potificia Universidad Católica de Chile. His research focuses on migration and auto-constructed settlements in contexts of informality. He conducted fieldwork in Santiago de Chile, a city that has become an important host to migrants in South America. Before his Ph.D., he worked as a research assistant on the Latin American Anti-Racism in a “Post-Racial” Age project.

Check out these related resources:

• "Venezuela Blackout: What Caused It and What Happens Next?”
• “Is One Third of Venezuela’s Population About to Flee?”
• “A Multinational, Multiethnic Alternative in Chile's Migrant Settlements”
• “221 Politicians, 23 Journalists, and Six Human Rights Activists Detained Since the Presidential Elections”

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SAPIENS: A Podcast for Everything Human is produced by Written In Air. The executive producers are Dennis Funk and Chip Colwell. This season’s host is Eshe Lewis, who is also the director of the SAPIENS Public Scholars Training Fellowship program. Production and mix support are provided by Rebecca Nolan. Christine Weeber is the copy editor.

SAPIENS is an editorially independent magazine of the Wenner-Gren Foundation and the University of Chicago Press. SAPIENS: A Podcast for Everything Human is part of the American Anthropological Association Podcast Library.

This episode is part of the SAPIENS Public Scholars Training Fellowship program, which provides in-depth training for anthropologists in the craft of science communication and public scholarship, funded with the support of a three-year grant from the John Templeton Foundation.