Patrick Bixby, License to Travel

Professor Patrick Bixby's "License to Travel" takes the reader on a captivating journey from pharaonic Egypt and Han-dynasty China to the passport controls and crowded refugee camps of today. Along the way, the reader:

Peruses the passports of artists and intellectuals, writers and musicians, ancient messengers and modern migrants. 

Sees how these seemingly humble documents implicate us in larger narratives about identity, mobility, citizenship, and state authority.

Encounters intimate stories of vulnerability and desire along with vivid examples drawn from world cinema, literature, art, philosophy, and politics.

Witnesses the authority that travel documents exercise over our movements and our emotions as we circulate around the globe.

 With unexpected discoveries at every turn, License to Travel exposes the passport as both an instrument of personal freedom and a tool of government surveillance powerful enough to define our very humanity.