An Autoethnography of Exile, Care, and Scholar-Activism

This autoethnography examines how scholar-activism is formed when scholarship emerges from illegality, exile, and forced return. Drawing on a longitudinal archive of public media interviews, professional documents, nonprofit materials, and structured reflexive writing (2026), I trace cyclical migrations from undocumented youth in Texas to return migrant in Mexico, doctoral student in Canada, and nurse scientist back in Texas. Across these stages, intersecting identities as a gay, Latino, working-class migrant shaped how I navigated institutions and linked research with advocacy. The analysis identifies three formations: exile as a structural and epistemic formation; nursing as redistribution and structural intervention; and scholar-activism as dual infrastructure connecting evidence-building with community solidarity. From these, I develop acompañamiento científico (scientific accompaniment) as a praxis framework for scholars working in contexts of criminalized migration and health inequity, offering guidance for integrating scientific rigor with relational accountability in community-engaged and policy-oriented research.