No description available.

Thesis advisor: Kathleen Bailey / Recent times have seen the world fall far short of its responsibility to protect and support refugees in crisis. Recognizing this reality, policymakers and scholars are beginning to push for a reassessment of the traditional solutions to refugee crises implemented by states, the United Nations, and non-governmental organizations. This manuscript aims to shed light on how these policymakers can coalesce around more effective solutions in the future. To do so, it will analyze three case studies of refugee crises in Jordan: the Palestinians, Iraqis, and Syrians. The cases will seek to answer how and why Jordan chose to “solve” each crisis in the ways that it did. It will then assess how various “solutions”—meaning policies, programs, or partnerships aimed at improving the livelihoods of refugees—have affected each group of refugees differently. The effectiveness of these solutions will depend on a number of factors which constrain or enable Jordan’s ability to support refugees. Ultimately, the findings reveal that some solutions will remain unattainable to refugees in the near future. Others solutions, however, are evolving in ways that open doors to new, alternative solutions which possess significant potential to deliver the rights and meet the needs of the world’s refugees more effectively. In a world fraught by the persistence of global refugee crises, it will offer a few reasons why we should believe current United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, when he says there is “some hope.” / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2019. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Scholar of the College. / Discipline: Political Science.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

Background: Since 2011, there has been ongoing conflict in Syria, resulting in the displacement of over 11 million people. Over 40,000 Syrian refugees resettled to Canada and of that, 52% were under the age of 19, falling into the adolescent age group. Adolescence (ages 10-19) is a critical stage for physical, psychosocial and cognitive development. As a result, mental health challenges often first emerge during adolescence. Refugee adolescents are a particularly vulnerable group, as normal adolescent stress is compounded with resettlement stress. Further research is needed to understand how Syrian refugee adolescents conceptualize mental health so that their needs can be better addressed. Methods: Data was collected using semi-structured interviews with older Syrian refugee adolescents (n=7) and service providers (n=8) in the Greater Toronto Area. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. Data analysis was guided by grounded theory. Results: The findings indicate that conceptualizations of mental health are highly dependent on how the concept is framed. The term mental health was poorly understood amongst Syrian adolescents. However, when different terms were used to describe mental health, including stress, pressure and comfort, it was clear that adolescents had a much deeper understanding of the concept. Once appropriate mental health framing was employed, adolescents were able to identify factors that they believed influence mental health status. Factors identified by adolescents and service providers included individual, social and system-level factors. Conclusions: Syrian adolescent perspectives are crucial in fully understanding their conceptualizations of mental health. The comparison of adolescent and service provider perspectives allowed for a comprehensive understanding of adolescent mental health, while identifying differences in perspectives between the two groups. This study recommends future strategies for policy makers, service providers and researchers to effectively address Syrian adolescents’ mental health. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

After relocation to the United States, refugees are often assisted by community volunteers in the process of resettlement, which frequently includes navigating the financial and social aspects of life in the US. However, the medical and health aspects of resettlement, and particularly how volunteers are involved in those aspects, have gone unexplored, leading to tensions within volunteer-led resettlement groups as they attempt to negotiate the limits of volunteer involvement. To investigate how volunteers understand a process of health resettlement, their role(s) within the process, and how they rhetorically position their relationship with resettling clients, this study uses interview data from a local, volunteer-run community resettlement organization to provide a rhetorical examination of health resettlement. An analysis finds that in both contrast and response to a rhetoric of self-sufficiency established by state and federal policy, resettlement volunteers understand health resettlement through a rhetoric of responsibility. This rhetorical framework constitutes volunteers' role as proxy agents in the process of health resettlement. Additionally, volunteers use a gathered ethos approach within this framework, drawing from community networks in order to facilitate persuasion of resettling clients toward desired health outcomes. Ultimately, recommendations are made for community sponsorship and volunteer approaches to health resettlement for refugees in the United States. / Doctor of Philosophy / After relocation to the United States, refugees are often assisted by community volunteers in the process of resettlement, which frequently includes navigating the financial and social aspects of life in the US. However, the medical and health aspects of refugee resettlement, and particularly how volunteers are involved in those aspects, have gone unexplored. This study uses interviews with resettlement volunteers to understand how volunteers perceive their role within the health resettlement process, how they position themselves in relation to resettling refugees, and how they expect refugees to navigate health communication scenarios. It finds that volunteers feel a tension between a rhetoric of self-sufficiency that is established by policy and a rhetoric of responsibility that is established by humanitarian narratives. This tension motivates volunteers to act as communication intermediaries, performing health communication tasks on behalf of refugee clients while also attempting to persuade clients toward particular healthcare decisions. Recommendations are made for community sponsorship and volunteer approaches to health resettlement for refugees in the United States.

Home - the universally understood and desired state of being that is existing naturally, harmoniously, familiar, and whole. What does it mean to leave home and to seek refuge? And how do we find home again? Throughout history and today, communities across the globe have either suffered in or been plagued with a refugee crisis in some form. Laos is the most bombed country per capita in history. During the American Secret War on Laos, 270 million tons of cluster bombs were dropped on Laos from 1964-1973: equivalent to a planeload of bombs every 8 minutes, 24 hours per day, for 9 years. Today, over 265,000 Lao Americans live in the United States with a majority of them arriving as refugees in the 1980s as a result of the Secret War. Lao Americans forced from their homes have since found refuge but what does it look like for them to come home? Understanding home as not only defined as a physical geospatial location, what creates the physiological sense being at home in one's body and one's mind? These are the questions underpinning this thesis. They necessitate an understanding of psychology, sociology, and neurology in a way that has traditionally not been a framework of architectural education and design process thinking. As the broader mental health crisis and concern for well-being continues to dominate societal struggles, architecture and design are called upon to evolve their methodologies. Making Space: Refuge to Home presents a design methodology that focuses on cultivating an informed and empathic client relationship in order to drive intentional design choices based on desired physiological outcomes. In doing so, this thesis offers an approach of how to navigate the complexities of place, home, safety, and identity in order to make space that shifts from providing refuge and safety, to being home and whole. By utilizing participatory story-telling, psycho-social outcome identification, and empathic imagination, this thesis develops a trauma-informed and well-being centric design approach for cultivating resilience and making space to come home. This methodological rigor is applied specifically to the Lao American community and their experience of forced resettlement and intergenerational trauma. Making Space: Refuge to Home challenges traditional architectural approaches that often lean on cultural appropriation, iconographic motifs, or traditional programmatic understandings of what a cultural center is and instead, crafts a new design language. The result is a design approach that places the lived emotional and physiological experience of the user group first. The result is an attempt at a more authentic and complex understanding of home that straddles a multiplicity of cultures and lived realities. / Master of Architecture / Home - the universally understood and desired state of being that is existing naturally, harmoniously, familiar, and whole. What does it mean to leave home and to seek refuge? And how do we find home again? Throughout history and presently, communities across the globe have either suffered in or been plagued with a refugee crisis. Laos is the most bombed country per capita in history. During the American Secret War on Laos, 270 million tons of cluster bombs were dropped on Laos from 1964-1973: equivalent to a planeload of bombs every 8 minutes, 24 hours per day, for 9 years. Today, over 265,000 Lao Americans live in the United States with a majority of them arriving as refugees in the 1980s as a result of the Secret War. Lao Americans forced from their homes have since found refuge but what does it look like for them to come home? Understanding home as not only defined as a physical geospatial location, what creates the physiological sense being at home in one's body and one's mind? These are the questions underpinning this thesis. The direct connection of the built environment and individual well-being has only become more apparent in the past two years as a widespread societal awakening towards systemic issues around public health have been illuminated during the global pandemic. As the mental health crisis and concern for well-being continues to dominate societal struggles, Making Space: Refuge to Home presents a design methodology that focuses on using psychology, sociology, and neurology to inform an empathic client relationship that is better equipped to drive intentional design choices. In doing so, this thesis offers a trauma-informed and well-being centric design approach of how to navigate the complexities of place, home, safety, and identity in order to make space that transforms from simply offering refuge to being home. This method is applied specifically to a study of the Lao American community and their lived experience of forced resettlement and intergenerational trauma. Although the thesis focuses on the Lao American community, Making Space: Refuge to Home, speaks to all communities and individuals navigating multiple identities and cultures, seeking wholeness - seeking home.

In 1997, the Virginia Refugee Health Program coordinated a protocol and reimbursement structure to encourage health departments to perform initial health screenings on refugees settling in the Commonwealth by establishing four recommended levels of assessment. This thesis is concerned with these initial health-related services provided to refugees by Virginia's health departments, the quality of these services, and how they vary from one district to another. For this study, I interviewed health department staff representing 13 of Virginia's 19 districts that rendered health screenings in 2000. Information such as the level of assessment provided, and the types of procedures and services offered were the main foci of the interviews. I found that of the 13 districts, three (the cities of Alexandria and Virginia Beach, and Prince William County) offer only the required minimum to refugees. The variations I discovered in the services that health districts provide suggest, conceptually, the workings of both "structure" and "agency." Each health department is formally and informally structured in terms of staffing, services, and resources in accordance with its individual needs and initiatives. The structure of current funding at both the state and local level acts to inhibit some health districts from providing all four levels of assessment. In addition, human agency in the form of personal interest in meeting refugee's health needs as well as district collaboration with local resettlement agencies, also plays an important role in the extent of refugee services rendered. / Master of Science