The changing meaning of sport during forced immigrant youths' acculturative journeys

Centralizing forced immigrant male youths’ stories in the development of socially just and inclusive community sport programs.

“…Community sport providers supporting forced immigrant youths’ resettlement can play a role in providing space for informal sport opportunities. The youths’ previous story (see Middleton et al, 2021) revealed how connection with family members was prioritized, yet the current story also shows how, once settled, youth began to seek connections with other youth and coaches in and outside of sport contexts. Prioritizing youths’ desire to connect with others in addition to fostering individual sport-specific and life skill development reveals the subtle ways in which integration may be fostered through sport (Stone, 2018).…”

“…Providing informal sport opportunities has been touted by researchers in the United Kingdom and Australia as a way of engaging youth from marginalized backgrounds in sport (Jeanes et al, 2019; King & Church, 2017). For youth collaborators, informal sport opportunities in a known sport activity (which often was soccer) provided a connection to their early enculturation into sport in their home countries (see Middleton et al, 2021). Subsequently, many youth felt a sense of cultural safety which has been considered to be a precursor to feeling comfortable engaging in intercultural interactions (see Berry, 2019).…”

“…Their families had been privately sponsored by, and were recipients of support from, community groups for a 1-year period. Non-Syrian youth were asylum claimants in Canada and as such did not receive and/or qualify for the same support programs (for a more detailed story related to their journeys to Canada, see Middleton et al, 2021).…”

“…Relevant to the present article, ethnocentric sport opportunities may also be unavailable to forced immigrant youth arriving in Canada, as they often have a greater lack of connection to their home community than individuals who voluntarily relocated (Hynie et al, 2016). Overcoming barriers to engaging in sport has meant, for many forced immigrant youth, playing with those they felt safe doing so with at different points in time (Middleton et al, 2021). Recognizing the resilience shown by youth during their forced migration also means acknowledging their intellectual authority on matters related to the development of socially just and culturally safe sport contexts.…”

‘Should I really be here?’: Problems of trust and ethics in PAR with young people from refugee backgrounds in sport and leisure

“…Research to co-design/ implement a Syrian Youth Sports Club and Middleton et al (2021) utilised Community Based Participatory Action Research (CBPAR) with forced immigrant youth to create vignette stories about the role of sport within their life journeys. In the UK, Stone (2018) explored the relationship between football, hope, and belonging among adult male refugees and asylum seekers and used PAR alongside ethnography to co-create a recreational football program.…”