Since 2006, when the Mexican government declared a “war against drug cartels,” more than 110,000 people have disappeared, more than 300,000 have been murdered, and there has been a steady increase in criminal violence throughout the country. Ten women are victims of feminicide every day. Struggles for truth, justice, memory, reparations, and non-repetition have become widespread and urgent within this context of intersecting violence, widespread impunity and corruption. This course examines some of the historical continuities of state violence in Mexico, and the links between structural violences and human rights issues: enforced disappearances, violence against women, migrant deaths, extractivism and the displacement of people, attacks against activists and journalists, and the ongoing discrimination and dispossession of indigenous peoples' lands. We will see how the actions to demand justice organized by collectives of searchers for the disappeared, feminists, activists, academics and artists show that the existing violence is not only related to drugs and organized crime, but has deep historical, political and economic roots. Through interdisciplinary materials (including films, literature, poetry and academic texts) and guest speakers from Mexico, students will learn what is at stake in the struggle for human rights and justice in Mexico, on both sides of the border.