Anthony Wayne Fontes
Biographic Data
| ID | 117151 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Anthony Wayne Fontes |
| GIVEN NAMES | Anthony Wayne |
| FAMILY NAME | Fontes |
| SIGNATURE | FONTES A W |
| AFFILIATIONS | American University, USA |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7263-6564 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 10 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 25 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 10 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2016 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
The kidnappers are the police: Criminal governance and forced migration in Central America
Taxation and incarceration in Guatemala: Prisons, protection rackets, and citizenship
This article explores the making of carceral citizenship in Guatemala through an ethnographic analysis of la talacha – informal prison taxation schemes. Taxation is a key technology of citizenship. Tax enforcement mechanisms, the distribution of tax burdens, citizens’ willingness to pay, and their expectations of what they should get in return all make taxation an essential lens through which to understand state formation and citizens’ perception…
Carceral community in the time of Covid-19: Isolation, adaption, and predation
State failures to protect prisoners from COVID-19 have made prisons key “hotspots” of infection, particularly in the “new mass carceral zone” of Latin America. In Guatemala, which has the 3 rd most overcrowded prison system in the world, such failure was a tragedy foretold. Longstanding hostility towards criminalized populations ensured that prisoners would be left to fend for themselves. This does not mean, however, that we should cast the priso…
Becoming fugitive: Prison breaks and the space of punishment
Dominant metanarratives of prison escape-as rebellion in the name of freedom and as spectacular revelation of prison organizational failure-stand in stark contrast to the experience and meaning of escape for those for whom it matters most: prisoners. For prisoners, escape does not necessarily constitute a line of flight out of the space and time of punishment. Instead, it abruptly transforms their relationship to state power and communal belongin…
Scam as survival in Central America
This essay explores the intimate details and ethical quandaries of tele-promotion's fraud. Perpetrated from inside Guatemalan prisons using black market cellphones, incarcerated gang members surf the affects of capitalism to create a sensorium of authenticity through which they swindle the unwary. An experiment in genre, this ethnographic essay foregrounds the lived experiences, survival strategies, and virtuosities of those pushed to the very ma…
La Visita: Prisons and Survival in Guatemala
Based largely on research completed in the North American context, scholars of prisons detail the multiple ways in which carceral practices extend beyond prison walls to transform a wide variety of spaces, ultimately assessing how carceral imaginaries inhabit the most intimate aspects of everyday life. In Latin America, this division between the inside and the outside of prison breaks down even further when read from the perspective of survival. …
Portrait of a 'real' marero: Fantasy and falsehood in stories of gang violence
In 21st-century Guatemala transnational gangs (or maras) have become erstwhile emissaries of extreme peacetime violence, distilling in spectacular fashion the fear, rage, and trauma swirling around out-of-control crime. Young gang members (or mareros) are drawn in by and work hard to recreate the phantasmagoric figure the maras cut in social imaginaries, linking the acts of violence gangs perform to the ways gang members - and myriad others - mak…
Mortal Doubt: Transnational Gangs and Social Order in Guatemala City
Twenty years since the end of Central America’s longest and bloodiest civil war, Guatemala City is dominated by both the fact and fear of out-of-control crime. In powerful, haunting prose, Mortal Doubt takes readers inside the making of this new order of violence through the evolution of its most infamous emissary: the maras , or transnational gangs. While maras are widely blamed for the rise of peacetime crime, Anthony W. Fontes argues that they…
Mortal Doubt: Transnational Gangs and Social Order in Guatemala City
Extorted Life: Protection Rackets in Guatemala City
Extortion is the most common of crimes in Central America today and the most despised. As a growing criminal phenomenon, it exemplifies trends prevalent across post-Cold War Latin America as well as other parts of the world. In many societies, the "democratic wave" and the triumph of market fundamentalism has been accompanied by deepening uncertainty: the state has become criminal, criminals counterfeit the state. For those caught in the middle, …
Extorted Life: Protection Rackets in Guatemala City
Extortion is the most common of crimes in Central America today and the most despised. As a growing criminal phenomenon, it exemplifies trends prevalent across post-Cold War Latin America as well as other parts of the world. In many societies, the "democratic wave" and the triumph of market fundamentalism has been accompanied by deepening uncertainty: the state has become criminal, criminals counterfeit the state. For those caught in the middle, …
La Visita: Prisons and Survival in Guatemala
Based largely on research completed in the North American context, scholars of prisons detail the multiple ways in which carceral practices extend beyond prison walls to transform a wide variety of spaces, ultimately assessing how carceral imaginaries inhabit the most intimate aspects of everyday life. In Latin America, this division between the inside and the outside of prison breaks down even further when read from the perspective of survival. …
Becoming fugitive: Prison breaks and the space of punishment
Dominant metanarratives of prison escape-as rebellion in the name of freedom and as spectacular revelation of prison organizational failure-stand in stark contrast to the experience and meaning of escape for those for whom it matters most: prisoners. For prisoners, escape does not necessarily constitute a line of flight out of the space and time of punishment. Instead, it abruptly transforms their relationship to state power and communal belongin…
Portrait of a 'real' marero: Fantasy and falsehood in stories of gang violence
In 21st-century Guatemala transnational gangs (or maras) have become erstwhile emissaries of extreme peacetime violence, distilling in spectacular fashion the fear, rage, and trauma swirling around out-of-control crime. Young gang members (or mareros) are drawn in by and work hard to recreate the phantasmagoric figure the maras cut in social imaginaries, linking the acts of violence gangs perform to the ways gang members - and myriad others - mak…
The kidnappers are the police: Criminal governance and forced migration in Central America
Carceral community in the time of Covid-19: Isolation, adaption, and predation
State failures to protect prisoners from COVID-19 have made prisons key “hotspots” of infection, particularly in the “new mass carceral zone” of Latin America. In Guatemala, which has the 3 rd most overcrowded prison system in the world, such failure was a tragedy foretold. Longstanding hostility towards criminalized populations ensured that prisoners would be left to fend for themselves. This does not mean, however, that we should cast the priso…
Scam as survival in Central America
This essay explores the intimate details and ethical quandaries of tele-promotion's fraud. Perpetrated from inside Guatemalan prisons using black market cellphones, incarcerated gang members surf the affects of capitalism to create a sensorium of authenticity through which they swindle the unwary. An experiment in genre, this ethnographic essay foregrounds the lived experiences, survival strategies, and virtuosities of those pushed to the very ma…
Extorted Life: Protection Rackets in Guatemala City
Extortion is the most common of crimes in Central America today and the most despised. As a growing criminal phenomenon, it exemplifies trends prevalent across post-Cold War Latin America as well as other parts of the world. In many societies, the "democratic wave" and the triumph of market fundamentalism has been accompanied by deepening uncertainty: the state has become criminal, criminals counterfeit the state. For those caught in the middle, …
Mortal Doubt: Transnational Gangs and Social Order in Guatemala City
Twenty years since the end of Central America’s longest and bloodiest civil war, Guatemala City is dominated by both the fact and fear of out-of-control crime. In powerful, haunting prose, Mortal Doubt takes readers inside the making of this new order of violence through the evolution of its most infamous emissary: the maras , or transnational gangs. While maras are widely blamed for the rise of peacetime crime, Anthony W. Fontes argues that they…
Mortal Doubt: Transnational Gangs and Social Order in Guatemala City
La Visita: Prisons and Survival in Guatemala
Based largely on research completed in the North American context, scholars of prisons detail the multiple ways in which carceral practices extend beyond prison walls to transform a wide variety of spaces, ultimately assessing how carceral imaginaries inhabit the most intimate aspects of everyday life. In Latin America, this division between the inside and the outside of prison breaks down even further when read from the perspective of survival. …
Portrait of a 'real' marero: Fantasy and falsehood in stories of gang violence
In 21st-century Guatemala transnational gangs (or maras) have become erstwhile emissaries of extreme peacetime violence, distilling in spectacular fashion the fear, rage, and trauma swirling around out-of-control crime. Young gang members (or mareros) are drawn in by and work hard to recreate the phantasmagoric figure the maras cut in social imaginaries, linking the acts of violence gangs perform to the ways gang members - and myriad others - mak…
Scam as survival in Central America
This essay explores the intimate details and ethical quandaries of tele-promotion's fraud. Perpetrated from inside Guatemalan prisons using black market cellphones, incarcerated gang members surf the affects of capitalism to create a sensorium of authenticity through which they swindle the unwary. An experiment in genre, this ethnographic essay foregrounds the lived experiences, survival strategies, and virtuosities of those pushed to the very ma…
Carceral community in the time of Covid-19: Isolation, adaption, and predation
State failures to protect prisoners from COVID-19 have made prisons key “hotspots” of infection, particularly in the “new mass carceral zone” of Latin America. In Guatemala, which has the 3 rd most overcrowded prison system in the world, such failure was a tragedy foretold. Longstanding hostility towards criminalized populations ensured that prisoners would be left to fend for themselves. This does not mean, however, that we should cast the priso…
Becoming fugitive: Prison breaks and the space of punishment
Dominant metanarratives of prison escape-as rebellion in the name of freedom and as spectacular revelation of prison organizational failure-stand in stark contrast to the experience and meaning of escape for those for whom it matters most: prisoners. For prisoners, escape does not necessarily constitute a line of flight out of the space and time of punishment. Instead, it abruptly transforms their relationship to state power and communal belongin…
Taxation and incarceration in Guatemala: Prisons, protection rackets, and citizenship
This article explores the making of carceral citizenship in Guatemala through an ethnographic analysis of la talacha – informal prison taxation schemes. Taxation is a key technology of citizenship. Tax enforcement mechanisms, the distribution of tax burdens, citizens’ willingness to pay, and their expectations of what they should get in return all make taxation an essential lens through which to understand state formation and citizens’ perception…
The kidnappers are the police: Criminal governance and forced migration in Central America
Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance (9 works) · Political science (9 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Criminology (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (4 works) · Law (4 works) · Art (3 works) · Ethnography (3 works) · Homelessness and Social Issues (3 works)