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Syrian Refugees’ Experiences of the Pandemic in Canada: Barriers to Integration and Just Solutions
No full textResearch has shown high levels of housing precarity among government-assisted refugees (GARs) connected to difficult housing markets, limited social benefits, and other social and structural barriers to positive settlement (Lumley-Sapanski, 2021). The COVID-19 pandemic has likely exacerbated this precarity. Research to date demonstrates the negative consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic for refugees and low-income households, including both health-related issues and economic challenges, that may exacerbate their ability to obtain affordable, suitable housing (Jones & Grigsby-Toussaint, 2020; Shields & Alrob, 2020). In this context, we examined Syrian government-assisted refugees’ experiences during the pandemic, asking: how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted Syrian refugees’ experiences of housing stability. To examine this issue, we interviewed 38 families in Calgary, London, and Fredericton. Using a qualitative descriptive methodology for analysis and interpretation (Thorne et al., 1997), we found the liminality of settling as a GAR has been compounded by isolation, further economic loss, and new anxieties during the pandemic. Ultimately, for many participants, the pandemic has thwarted their housing stability goals and decreased their likelihood of improving their housing conditions. Based on our findings, we discuss potential policy and practice relevant solutions to the challenges faced by refugees in Canada during the pandemic and likely beyond
Socio-structural Injustice, Racism, and the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Precarious Entanglement among Black Immigrants in Canada
No full textAs several commentators and researchers have noted since late spring 2020, COVID-19 has laid bare the connections between entrenched structurally generated inequalities on one hand, and on the other hand relatively high degrees of susceptibility to contracting COVID-19 on the part of economically marginalized population segments. Far from running along the tracks of race neutrality, studies have demonstrated that the pandemic is affecting Black people more than Whites in the U.S.A. and U.K., where reliable racially-disaggregated data are available. While the situation in Canada seems to follow the same pattern, race-specific data on COVID-19 are hard to come by. At present, there is no federal mandate to collect race-based data on COVID-19, though, in Ontario, at the municipal level, the City of Toronto has been releasing such data. This paper examines the entanglements of race, immigration status and the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada with particular emphasis on Black immigrants and non-immigrants in Toronto, using multiple forms of data pertaining to income, housing, immigration, employment and COVID-19 infections and deaths. Our findings show that the pandemic has had a disproportionate negative impact on Black people and other racialized people in Toronto and, indeed, Canada
Representation Matters: Race, Gender, Class, and Intersectional Representations of Autistic and Disabled Characters on Television
No full textMedia reflect and affect social understandings, beliefs, and values on many topics, including the lives of autistic and disabled people. Media analysis has garnered attention in the field of disability studies, which some scholars and activists consider a promising approach to discussing the experiences of – and for promoting social justice for – autistic people, who remain underrepresented on scripted television. Additionally, existing portrayals often rely on stereotyped representations of disabled individuals as objects of pity, objects of inspiration, or villains. Television may also serve as a primary source of public knowledge about disabled people and the concept of disability. It is therefore essential that such portrayals avoid stigma and stereotyping. We take a disability studies lens to critically analyze and compare representations of diverse people, who may sometimes be conflated in the popular imaginary, across television series about autistic characters (Atypical, The Good Doctor), those with cerebral palsy (Speechless, Special), and a character with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (Shameless). We employ an intersectional analytic framework to problematize representations of autistic and disabled people, using television, feminist, and critical disability studies literatures. We analyze how the formal structure of television storytelling can either enable or disable its characters, as well as how portrayals of disability that display a sensitivity to concerns raised by critical disability discourse do not necessarily display the same sensitivity when they intersect with marginalized experiences of gender, sexuality, race, and class.
La Solidaridad o la Soledad? Cooperation and Tensions in the Regional State Response to the Venezuelan Migration Crisis
No full textThe Venezuelan migration crisis has displaced over six million people and is the Americas’ largest forced migration. Nearby countries have received the majority of the displaced and initially showed an impressive welcome to Venezuelans, regardless of whether they may be considered migrants, asylum seekers, or refugees. However, host country responses have mainly been uncoordinated, siloed, and impromptu. This paper examines the solidarities and tensions within the individual country responses of Venezuela’s closest Latin American and Andean neighbors: Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, and Brazil. The number of displaced people leaving Venezuela has steadily increased since 2015 yet limited long term-planning and inclusion of migrants in host communities has led to a growth in xenophobia. Additionally, many Latin American host nations have erected new barriers that make legal entry or residency forms more difficult for migrants to obtain. The COVID-19 pandemic has compounded these issues as host countries grapple with supporting and offering resources to their citizens in addition to migrants. However, some promising regional solutions could be applied in a more coordinated regional approach to help ensure that host countries and IOs supporting them can better extend enduring solidarity and inclusion to Venezuelans. These solutions include longer-term visa options, such as the new Colombian 10-year visa, that can help regularize and include Venezuelans over a prolonged period. A particularly recommended approach would be the regional application of an inventive Latin America humanitarian-orientated accord, the Cartagena Declaration, a forward-thinking concept with a potential that has never been realized. The Cartagena Declaration could offer more comprehensive protection and fairer access to rights beyond temporary measures
Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy (Book Review)
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\u27Wedding Bells and Colonial Hells\u27: Indigenous-Settler Intermarriage in Colonial North America
No full textThis essay examines the practice of Indigenous-settler intermarriage during the colonial period of North America. While historians know that intermarriage was an economic strategy used by both settler men and North American native women during the fur trade era, inaccuracies in parish records fail to demonstrate how prevalent the practice really was in this region. This paper thus presents an examination of what reasons both sides of the dynamic had for practicing interracial marriage and what benefits they derived from its execution. Indeed, the first half of the essay aims to analyze the physiological, psychological, economic, and imperialistic benefits Indigenous women, settler men, and related stakeholders enjoyed as a result of intermarriage using examples from both colonial Canada and America. The second half looks at what drawbacks resulted from intermarriage, emphasizing that these drawbacks were mainly isolated to the later years of colonization when European influence and power had spread throughout the continent. The legacy of Indigenous-settler intermarriage and the devastation of colonization persists still today which is why this topic is a worthy addition to the historical discourse
Orient the open end toward yourself – begin by folding the world in quarters.
No full textMore sleight of hand than photography, these images raise questions about photography’s power of possession. With a scanner and a darkened room, I have become a gatherer of bodies. In attempting to capture matter, I have unwittingly become a collector of omens. This strange collection of preserved skins, hyperphysical remains of bone, stone and lichen offer a luminescent echo of forests burning and ice melting—atavistic decompositions—likenesses rendering the destructive legacy of overpopulation and overconsumption.
