Negotiating Ethnic Identity and Self-Identity in the
Light of Cultural Change: A Case Study of
Liberian Refugees in Nova Scotia
Steve Crépeault
According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR), resettlement from the country of asylum to a third host
country is one of the three ‘durable solutions’ to what have been called the
‘refugee problem’ (UNHCR, 2000). To the refugee, resettlement is the
opportunity to get a fresh start. Refugee lives have been academically examined
since the Second World War, and since the 1990s, refugees became the center of a
new field called ‘refugee studies’. Despite the increasing attention to
refugees, the focus of study has been about migrations, resettlement, etc.
(need research); however, little has been written about how refugees
renegotiate their identity and deal with the cultural divide between them and
their new host culture. While several academics have looked at how identity is
constructed for migrant populations, very few have focused on the experiences
of particular refugee groups in Canada.
The construction of identity has been the
focus of several disciplines over the years. Anthropology looked at identity as a social form and especially
experiences of shared identities (Campbell and Rew, 1999: ix), where the
individual is reduced to an end to a mean. Sociology
similarly sees it from this perspective as well. Sociology sees identity as a
macro-political. There are variations but for the most part it is the same. Psychology sees identity as something
individual created by the brain. Several factors affect the creation of
identity such as employment as a source of primary identity for several
countries (Campbell and Rew, 1999: x). In addition, gender, religion,
ethnicity, nationality, (Ibid., 1999: ix) are also other lens in which identity
has been analyzed.
In this thesis, I provide an account of the development and negotiation
of identity among Liberian refugees resettling in Nova Scotia, Canada. My goal
is to understand how they reshape their identity in light of the historical,
structural, and individual factors. This research project aims to understand
how Liberian refugees perceive themselves and creates, negotiate their new
identity in the context of going in an area where there are very little
infrastructure to help them foster a sense of their former identity.
Through most disciplines, refugees have been perceived as a problem. The
stresses and
strains of refugee lives have been well documented; however, the disciplines
have mostly ignored the refugees’ “strengths and inventiveness of their
responses” (Camino et al., 1994: xvi). In the
case of resettlement, refugees can often be seen as potential economic assets
as in Nova Scotia where the population has been migrating towards larger urban
centers. In resettlement, refugees are perceived as by the population and
government as the victims, a category of people in need of help.
There is an obvious lack of cultural understanding of refugee
populations from the point of view of the government and settlement agencies by
judging the little literature available to these institutions. The patriarchal
language used by these institutions reflects the relegation of the refugees as
subjects who have no control on their own actions.
Canada is one of only ten
countries which boast annual quotas on the number of refugees that can resettle
within the borders (Colic-Peisker 2005). The small numbers of refugees that
enter the country with the assistance of the government each year are
negatively perceived with apprehension, fear, and suspicion. According to
Castles (2004), resettled refugees “are accused of bringing poverty, disease
and crime, of being terrorists, of taking our jobs, or sponging off welfare”
(Castles 2004).
There are several
stereotypical ways to perceive refugees: as threats to nations and security of
nations, destined to be seen as negative economic agents that
will need more social security money than they will ever gain, cannot integrate
the Canadian society, need social and psychological services that is beyond
what can be offered in Canada at reasonable costs. This research aims to change these
perceptions.
In addition, the research
aims to fill a gap in the literature about the experiences of Liberian refugees
in Nova Scotia. Although there is some literature about refugees in Canada (see
DeVoretz et al., 2005; Dyck et al. 2004; Lamba, 2003;
Macklin, 1996; McLellan, 1996), most of them focus on large centers such as
Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal, and the few documents that focus on refugees
in Nova Scotia do not target the Liberian population. Although the target of
the population of Liberian refugees is fairly small in Halifax, I believe that
their case can help to establish limited comparisons with other Sub-Saharan
nations.
The purpose of this
qualitative study is to understand the processes of change that the refugees
must go through when resettling in a new country. By identifying how Liberian
refugees adapt themselves to life in Canada, it is my hope that this research
will add to the discussion on their current situation and create a political
debate which would allow the government and NGOs to take proper actions and
invite change in order to improve the services offered to the refugees not only
after arrival, but after even they become Canadians. In Canada, sponsored
refugees must fight several levels of discrimination when they resettle. I wish
to explore how Liberian refugees are welcome in Canada, adapt to their new
environment, and explore several layers to see how their situation can be
improved politically at a policy level, socially, economically, and culturally