Class of 2025
(She/Her/Ella)
Hometown: Clinton, North Carolina
Major: Public Policy
Minor: History
Certificate: Human Rights
Mellon Project: Bidirectional Migrant Education: Learning from and Amplifying the Experiences of Farmworkers in North Carolina
As humans, we view food as a need, an object we acquire at the store to cook and feed our families, but behind the simplistic ideology of food, hundreds of thousands of farmworkers' stories show the struggles to feed millions of families, struggling to feed their own. Thousands of U.S. farmworkers start their stories in their homeland, where they migrate thousands of miles toward the U.S., searching for economic stability. However, once farmworkers arrive in the U.S., their interactions with Americans differ as they establish themselves. I will conduct a series of oral interviews and ethnographic observations to create an analysis of farmworker lives, labor, and especially their interaction outside of the immigrant community. I will primarily focus on farmworkers in Sampson County, North Carolina, from which I originate. The interviews will focus on documenting the experiences of farmworkers with different migration circumstances (H-2A/H-2B visa farmworkers, immigrant farmworkers) to answer the question, "What are the social interactions and experiences of farmworkers within North Carolina?" This research will not only serve as an educational tool for community members unaware of the struggles of farmworkers, but it will also serve as an archive to store and share the migration stories of farmworkers.
Academic Interests: Labor rights, Human Rights, Farmworker Rights, Political Engagement, Immigration
Brief Bio: Yadira Paz-Martinez is a senior studying Public Policy and History with a certificate in Human Rights. She is Mexican-American and the proud daughter of Mexican farm working undocumented immigrants. Yadira is the current Duke Student Government Vice President for Equity and Outreach and one of the Co-Presidents for Duke Define America. She is also a Benjamin N. Duke Scholar, Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow, and Truman Scholar.