Gratitude and Hospitality: Tamil Refugee Employment in London and the Conditional Nature of Integration

Abstract

Refugees are often one of the most economically and socially excluded groups in host countries. The policy of integration attempts to address different elements of exclusion, yet relatively little research has considered what integration means to the refugees themselves. This paper explores one key area for supporting integration: employment. Understandings of integration are advanced by exploring how a group of twenty-six Tamil refugees and nineteen people who worked with refugees in the UK perceived an underlying rhetoric of anticipated gratitude within the policies around refugees. These perspectives are theorised within a framework of hospitality. The participants believed that refugees were expected to be grateful to the host society, and subsequently felt a debt for what the host society had given them: safety and education. However, they also identified frustration towards the host society where they felt marginalised or discrimination. It is possible to analyse employment as both an opportunity to give back, and something for which to be grateful. However, gratitude may not necessarily be felt towards the host society. If employment is found through the ethnic community, gratitude is likely to be concentrated there, rather than in the wider society. For the refugee participants in this research, asylum is a debt which can rarely be fully repaid, leaving them to seek acceptance and respect beyond the tolerance they are offered.

Understanding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on refugee communities in San Diego, California: A participatory action research cross-sectional study

“…People who were unemployed and not looking for work, and younger respondents, both reported worse levels of mental health in their communities; these associations were significant only among respondents who have lived in the US for six or more years. These findings are in line with the mental shifts associated with long-term resettlement, in which many refugees transition from a perspective of hope at being accepted into a new country and leaving a place of persecution, political instability, disaster or war, into a perspective of hopelessness at dealing with the trauma they experienced in their countries of origin and living in a country where economic insecurity, cultural stressors, and social and structural discrimination present ongoing barriers ( Healey, 2014 ; Marshall et al, 2005 ; McMichael et al, 2017 ; Uribe Guajardo et al, 2016 ). It has also been suggested that in addition to serving as a proxy for acculturation, longer-term residence in a host country may be a marker for the manifestation of protracted discrimination and isolation which additionally compound adverse mental health ( Gleeson et al, 2020 ).…”

“…Second, as refugees are in the United States for longer periods of time, not only are they eligible for fewer sources of additional support, but they are increasingly acculturated, and may be more aware of, or open to discussing, issues such as household violence and substance misuse than new immigrants ( Dalgaard & Montgomery, 2015 ; van Os et al, 2020 ). In tandem, refugees in [Details omitted for blind peer-review]-served communities have discussed the emotional process associated with resettlement, characterized by an initial gratitude for having survived the turmoil and strife in their country of origin and being given a second chance, followed by a waning of that gratitude as the realities of struggles in their new home set in ( Healey, 2014 ; McMichael et al, 2017 ). These two explanations are supported in part by the fact that both community food insecurity and substance misuse use were substantially lower in San Diego refugee community respondents who had been in the US for five years or fewer.…”

Hospitable universities and integration of refugees: First responses from Austria and Poland

“…We define hospitable practices within HE as all forms of support that facilitate or contribute to the wellbeing (Perumal, 2015), empowerment (Healey, 2014) and social inclusion (Marci, 2013) of those perceived as strangers, in this case, refugees (but, theoretically, also migrants, non-traditional students etc.). Hospitable practices acknowledge refugees as individual actors with particular experience, skills and talents that can be integrated into the host society, and which can enrich it (Healey, 2014; Marci, 2013; Wilson, 2010). Hospitality, as an act of welcoming ‘those who are strangers’ (Sutherland, 2006), urges us to move beyond the mere acknowledgement of an abstract right to education, including HE, towards thinking about overcoming vulnerability and marginalization of definitive groups of people and individuals through hospitable practices within HE.…”

DO WE REALLY OFFER REFUGE? Using Galtung's Concept of Structural Violence to Interrogate Refugee Resettlement Support in Aotearoa New Zealand

“…Host countries are generally reluctant to recognise how societal inequities may be harming former refugees (Healey 2014;Phillimore 2020). Existing citizens in resettlement countries often assume that resettled refugees are in a better situation than in their country of origin, and, therefore, that they should be grateful (Granados 2010).…”

“…As a result, many refugees brought to Aotearoa New Zealand have high health needs, and a consequent reduced ability to find paid employment. Refugees are also typically from ethnic backgrounds that are a minority in the wider population, meaning that they lack access to the extended social support network which has been shown to facilitate successful integration in other contexts (see Healey 2014;Strang and Ager 2010).…”