Detention at the Border of Language

The kidnapping of colonist Daniel Boone’s daughter Jemima is recast as the activity of a border patrol. As Enrique Chagoya notes, “Today, some politicians call refugees from Central America and other countries ‘illegal aliens’ but for me they are no different from the Pilgrims or Daniel Boone’s daughter.” Chagoya scrambled the identities of the figures, who take on heads borrowed from different Indigenous communities, while Jemima becomes a cartoon duck. In doing so, the artist calls attention to the irony that people living on historically stolen land carry hatred toward foreigners.