Structure

In deference to the constantly changing, never static lives of undocumented immigrants of the United States, the structure of Underground America is generally loose rather than rigid. As Peter Orner suggests in the introduction, this structure was decided upon only after trying a more thematic structure: “In the beginning, we thought of organizing the book by occupation. The table of contents would look something like: 1. Migrant Farmworker 2. Meatpacker 3. Construction worker 4. Day Laborer 5. Nanny” (11). While this would seem to many readers logical and easy-to-follow, Orner and his team realized that the immigrants interviewed for this work have worked a variety of jobs and cannot be so easily classified: “These men and women cannot be summed up by the jobs they do, no matter how hard or how many hours a day they work” (12). Thus, they chose not to adopt a classificatory system for the narratives. Instead, the testimonies...