White over.all Migrants’ Bodies: Deportation and Alienation in Chile through photographic activism

Displacement in the Global South has represented a challenge for many Latin American countries. In the twenty-first century, Venezuelans and Haitians have fled their countries and chosen Chile as a destination in their pursuit of a dignified life. This presentation is framed in the expulsion of 138 migrants from the Southern country on February 10, 2021; and in the photographic response that activist Yiniba Castillo launched online. Her self-portraits series condemns the irregularities and misbehaviors from this Chilean government’s arbitrary measure. I argue how government policies underexposed faces and bodies alienating migrants, making them disappear (Didi-Huberman) to perpetuate ethnic terror (Segato) within the region, and exacerbating their iron fist in migrant policies. In pictures where Castillo wears a white overall with handwritten information about this policy and a facemask, the photographer/subject occupies public places (i.e.: public transportation, parks) exposing herself to reclaim spaces that were denied to those deported. Castillo’s visual and political gesture is accompanied with texts exposing both the xenophobic narrative bias that media coverage and the national narrative of whiteness that state has secured for decades.