Still processing the powerful presentation and panel discussion with Jason de León - whose work on migrant deaths at the US-México border is just wow. Thinking about how we know what we know about the past (and present) and the role of research in presenting official absences. 
De León’s work provides tangible evidence of the known consequences of border policies that push migrants into taking ever more dangerous routes to cross the desert: deaths. His exhibition #HostileTerrain94 involves putting names and death details to every recorded death.
During the talk Jason acknowledged that the official figures we have for deaths are undoubtedly much lower than the reality because the authorities have no real interest in finding bodies and often bodies don’t long survive very long in the unforgiving Sonora desert.
He completed his own forensic research with a pig - acting as a proxy for a human, inc dressed in clothes - to record post-mortem processes. In this case, due to packs of vultures, the body was completely gone within days. Much quicker than previously assumed. Clothes remained.
Beyond the specifics of this research, his work opened up questions about the need to question accepted wisdom and to question official records as places to recovery truths. Think about how we presence convenient absences. Then, how do we share this knowledge with wider publics?
As with all truly groundbreaking research, it really did transcend the topic and made me realize (1) how important our work can be (2) need to question what we think we know (3) how combining many different sources and methods so skillfully really does reveal whole new worlds.
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