Hear My Voice/Escucha mi voz: The Testimonies of Children Detained at the Southern Border of the United States

by Warren Binford (Compiler), Michael Garcia Bochenek (Foreword by)

Overview

The moving stories of children in migration—in their own words.

"In Spanish and in English, a devastating first-person account of children’s experiences in detention at the southern U.S. border.... A powerful, critical document only made more heartbreaking in picture-book form." —Kirkus Reviews starred review

Every day, children in migration are detained at the US-Mexico border. They are scared, alone, and their lives are in limbo. Hear My Voice/Escucha mi voz shares the stories of 61 these children, from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Ecuador, and Mexico, ranging in age from five to seventeen—in their own words from actual sworn testimonies. Befitting the spirit of the project, the book is in English on one side; then flip it over, and there's a complete Spanish version.

Illustrated by 17 Latinx artists, including Caldecott Medalist and multiple Pura Belpré Illustrator Award-winning Yuyi Morales and Pura Belpré Illustrator Award-winning Raὺl the Third. Includes information, questions, and action points. Buying this book benefits Project Amplify, an organization that supports children in migration.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781523513482
Publisher:	Workman Publishing Company
Publication date:	04/13/2021
Edition description:	Bilingual edition
Pages:	96
Sales rank:	226,297
Product dimensions:	11.10(w) x 8.60(h) x 0.60(d)
Language:	Spanish
Age Range:	8 - 18 Years

About the Author

Project Amplify is a national campaign launched to establish legal protections for children in government care so that the brutality discovered on the border never happens again. Project Amplify's lead organizer is Warren Binford, an internationally recognized children's rights scholar and advocate who holds a tenured position as Professor of Law and serves as the Director of the Clinical Law Program at Willamette University. She founded Willamette's Child and Family Advocacy Clinic, which has provided pro bono legal support to children and families in crisis, as well as guidance on legislation and public policy.  She has published nearly 60 law review articles, book chapters, essays, NGO publications, and editorials and has given approximately 150 presentations, primarily on topics related to children's issues, throughout the country and around the world. Binford holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a B.A., summa cum laude with distinction, and an Ed.M. from Boston University. She lives in Oregon.

Michael Garcia Bochenek (foreword) is senior counsel to the Children’s Rights Division of Human Rights Watch, focusing on juvenile justice and refugee and migrant children. He has researched and reported on criminal and juvenile justice systems and prison conditions, the protection of refugees and internally displaced persons, the exploitation of migrant workers and other labor rights issues, the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons, and rights violations in armed conflict, including the use of children as soldiers. From 2006 to 2015, he was director of policy and then director of law and policy for Amnesty International’s secretariat in London, where he oversaw strategic litigation, among other responsibilities.  He holds a bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University and a law degree from Columbia University. In addition to English, he speaks Spanish and Portuguese. Michael lives in New York.

Editorial Reviews

★ 02/22/2021

Binford, founder of Project Amplify, assembles the testimonies of 61 migrant children from Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico, ages five to 17, in this hard-hitting, movingly illustrated book that utilizes the talents of 17 Mexican and Mexican American artists to share truths of life in U.S. Border Patrol and detention facilities. In the foreword, Michael Garcia Bochenek of Human Rights Watch states, “This book, a story for children by children, wasn’t easy to tell and isn’t easy to hear. But it’s not only a story of adults’ cruelty and neglect... it’s also a story of children’s strength, courage, and hope.” In English and Spanish, the text unfolds simply but meaningfully—with the children’s own words, intertwined not as a single, broad narrative but in a harmonious array of voices, each with a unique story to tell. Similarly, no single art style dominates. Contributed by illustrators including Caldecott Honoree Yuyi Morales and Pura Belpré winner Raúl the Third, each illustration—whether fantastical or realistic, bold or delicate, vibrant or muted—powerfully complements the accompanying testimony, underscoring the children’s humanity and the individuality of each perspective. This is a heartrending but vital work. Includes a reader’s guide. Ages 8–up. (Apr.)■

Publishers Weekly

"In Spanish and in English, a devastating first-person account of children’s experiences in detention at the southern U.S. border.... A powerful, critical document only made more heartbreaking in picture-book form."
—Kirkus Reviews starred review

"The text unfolds simply but meaningfully—with the children’s own words, intertwined not as a single, broad narrative but in a harmonious array of voices, each with a unique story to tell... this is a heartrending but vital work."
—Publishers Weekly starred review

Nautilus Award Winner - Gold Medalist in Middle Grade Non-fiction
Skipping Stones 2022 Honors books in Multicultural and International Books
New York Public Library best book for kids 2021
2022 Flora Stieglitz Straus award for excellence in children's nonfiction writing
2022 Kansas NEA Reading Circle Intermediate (Grades 3-5 / Ages 8-10) honor 
Children’s Book Committee best book of the year 2022 (ages nine through twelve, notation for diversity and outstanding merit) 

 

"In Spanish and in English, a devastating first-person account of children’s experiences in detention at the southern U.S. border.... A powerful, critical document only made more heartbreaking in picture-book form."
—Kirkus Reviews starred review

"The text unfolds simply but meaningfully—with the children’s own words, intertwined not as a single, broad narrative but in a harmonious array of voices, each with a unique story to tell... this is a heartrending but vital work."
—Publishers Weekly starred review

From the Publisher

★ 12/03/2021

Gr 1–5—If you haven't given much thought to the children in the camps at the U.S. border, Binford is about to get your attention. She gave 61 children from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Ecuador, and Mexico a chance to talk about their torturous conditions, their dreams, and their lives, shown in striking but brutal illustrations by 17 Latinx artists, including Yuyi Morales and Raúl the Third. There is no privacy for using the toilet. The food is welcome for fighting off pangs of hunger, but it is all but inedible. Siblings are separated. Reading like a tone poem or a moan for help, the spare text asks readers to fill in the details. VERDICT Listen to the children, who have no political gain. This is a book readers cannot ignore, and which belongs on every shelf.—Kimberly Olson Fakih

School Library Journal

★ 2021-03-02
In Spanish and in English, a devastating first-person account of children’s experiences in detention at the southern U.S. border.

The nightmare children have faced while separated from their families at the U.S.–Mexico border in recent years is detailed unsparingly via interview snippets from 61 migrant children ages 5 to 17. The words are interpreted by 17 different Latinx illustrators. While some of the artists build fantasy imagery, depicting the children as caged birds or representing escape from a dangerous country as flight from a terrifying monster, the most affecting double-page spreads simply detail the horrifying living conditions and allow expressions on faces to do the rest. Hunger, overcrowding, verbal abuse, and unsanitary conditions are only part of the horrors. “I have been here without bathing for twenty-one days,” one child says from behind chain-link fencing. “I wish I could get clean.” The Spanish-language version is bound dos-à-dos to the English one, and the children’s words are even more painful in their native language. Additional context on how the stories were captured and the legal issues around child detention is provided in a foreword and backmatter; it reinforces the impossible and cruel situation the migrant children have faced and their misplaced hope in a system that has failed them. It’s the kind of terrifying book that no adult should hand to a child before preparing to explain, with context, that the stories are true and that they must be remembered.

A powerful, critical document only made more heartbreaking in picture-book form. (Picture book. 8-18)

Kirkus Reviews