National Geographic

GENIUSJASON DE LEÓNBY RACHEL HARTIGAN SHEA PHOTOGRAPH BY DAN WINTERSWHAT HE’S FOUND:LOVE LETTERS, A CDPLAYER, TEQUILA,A BIBLE CONTAININGTICKETS TO A SOCCERMATCH IN BOLIVIA``````Archaeological skillshelped him unearth theancient. Now he usesthose skills to exploremodern migration.Jason De León began his career as atraditional archaeologist. He excavatedancient sites in Mexico, uncoveringartifacts that were centuries—if notmillennia—old. But as he was finishinghis dissertation on stone tools, he foundhimself increasingly drawn to the digs’laborers, who told him harrowing talesof crossing the border into the UnitedStates, only to be deported.Although he grew up near the bor-der in Texas and California, “I real-ized I didn’t know anything” aboutimmigration, De León says now. Buthe thought archaeology could be usedto understand the contentious issue.More than five million people haveattempted to cross the Sonoran Desertsince 2000. De León’s research revealshow that migration has changed overtime. For instance, in 2009 he beganfinding black plastic bottles. Whitejugs were too visible to Border Patrolagents; now migrants carried bottlesdecorated with pictures of the patronsaints of migrants or maps of importantlandmarks—products of a new industrybased on undocumented migration.De León describes his fieldwork as“eclectic.” Some days he walks the trails.On others he might interview migrantsat a shelter, safe house, or courthouse—or launch a drone to search for deadbodies. Archaeology is about “trying tounderstand human behavior in the pastthrough the study of what people leavebehind,” he says. “Nobody ever said thepast had to be a thousand years ago.”Jason De León directs the Undocumented Migration Project.