Black African Immigrants Research Articles

Workplace and Healthcare Discrimination Experiences and Choice of Medical Service Providers Among Black African Immigrants: a Study of a Ghanaian American Sample

Workplace and Healthcare Discrimination Experiences and Choice of Medical Service Providers Among Black African Immigrants: a Study of a Ghanaian American Sample

Cervical Cancer Screening Uptake and Experiences of Black African Immigrant Women in Canada

Cervical cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer-related death among African women. Unfortunately, in most sub-Saharan African nations, women are vulnerable if they are unaware that cervical cancer is preventable with frequent screening and early treatment. The aim of this study was to examine Black African immigrant women’s perceptions and experiences of cervical screening in British Columbia, Canada. Twenty Black African immigrant women were interviewed using the qualitative research method Interpretive Description. Data collection approaches included indepth interviews and analytic memos. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative technique guided by a socioecologic framework to capture subjective experiences and perceptions. Four key themes were identified, including confusing conceptualizations about cancer and cancer screening, competing priorities, concerns for modesty, and commitment to culture. The study findings point to the need for more active approaches to promoting cervical screening for this population.

“It is not just about my work, my identities count”: the Influence of Intersectional Identities on the Employment Experiences of Black African Immigrant Women in Ontario, Canada

“It is not just about my work, my identities count”: the Influence of Intersectional Identities on the Employment Experiences of Black African Immigrant Women in Ontario, Canada

Foregrounding black African immigrants in mathematics education research

Generally, research with Black youth/population in mathematics education have largely focused on their mathematics experiences in the context of United States with a special focus on issues of race/racism, equity, and social justice. While these studies are important and have informed our understanding of the schooling experiences of Black youth, there is a dearth of research with specificity on the mathematics learning experiences of Black African immigrant youth. In this paper, using duoethnography, we analyze our previous projects with Black African immigrant youth/families to argue for more nuances in the theoretical and methodological lenses when engaging with this population.

Country context, race and wages: A comparative analysis of Ethiopian immigrant labour market integration in the United States and Israel

AbstractAmerican immigration policy debates focus on immigrants' (lack of) labour market success. While research shows that Black African immigrants experience the largest wage disadvantage, studies rarely discuss whether country‐context—formed by immigration policy and migration history—matters for their wages and whether race matters differently across place. We use Israeli and US data to determine whether Ethiopian immigrants are most disadvantaged across country contexts. Our results indicate that Ethiopian immigrants' credentials are higher in the United States, but that does not lead to higher relative wages than in Israel. Because we find that Ethiopian immigrants who are most similar to the native‐born earn nearly identical wages to the most marginalized groups in both countries, it is clear that country context plays only a small role in wage disparities. Instead, discrimination and unobserved differences between groups are most important.

Theorizing Afrophobia Beyond Apartheid: Conflict Cultures in Neill Blomkamp's District 9

ABSTRACT The persistent Afrophobic attacks on black African immigrants in South Africa since the 1990s alert us to a new cultural watershed. Just when the country had done away with apartheid, the black-on-black attacks reified the emergence of a new cultural crisis. This article reflects on the emergent cultural identities enabled by practices of black-black violence. It takes conflict cultures as a frame to discuss Afrophobia in the context of new identity consciousness. This is achieved through a critique of Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 (2009), a film where racial antipathies are supplanted with a nebulous culture of aversion. Theorising this scenario as a euphemism for struggles with post-apartheid cultural reorganisation, the article suggests conflict culture as a theory that can account for incomplete identity transformation among all races of the South African nation.

Introduction: African International Migration to the West: Insights from Canada, Australia and Nigeria

Introduction: African International Migration to the West: Insights from Canada, Australia and Nigeria

Biopsychosocial Predictors of Depression and Anxiety Symptoms among First-Generation Black African Immigrants.

Few studies examine factors associated with mental health distress among immigrants from African countries. Using cross-sectional data from first-generation Black African immigrants across the United States (N = 180), this study examined biopsychosocial factors that influence depression and anxiety symptoms among African immigrants in the United States. Ordinary least squares regression was conducted to analyze the data. Approximately 22 percent of the sample reported depression and anxiety symptoms in the moderate to severe range. Results indicated that being male, substance use, discrimination, and loneliness were significantly associated with worse depression and anxiety symptoms. In addition, worries about safety and financial strain were associated with increased mental health distress. Loneliness also moderated the association between discrimination and depression and anxiety symptoms. Findings imply that relational interventions in direct practice settings may play a critical role in helping African immigrants ameliorate depression and anxiety symptoms. This study supports the use of the biopsychosocial approach in assessment and intervention of mental health symptoms as well as a systems approach when understanding the experiences of African immigrants.

Does Immigrant Selection Policy Matter? Labor Market Integration of Ethiopian Immigrants in Israel and the United States

Immigration policy debates currently focus on restricting immigration in favor of the highly skilled with the assumption that highly skilled immigrants will be better able to join the labor market and contribute to the economy. However, few studies empirically test the impact of immigrant selection policy by comparing labor market outcomes of immigrants from a single origin in multiple destinations. Fewer still address how race (specifically blackness) may impact the utility of these selection policies. This paper fills this gap by determining Ethiopian immigrants’ labor force participation, occupational status, and self-employment in the United States and Israel—countries with and without immigrant selection policies respectively. We find that Ethiopians experience similar labor market disadvantages relative to the native-born in both countries. These results indicate that rather than selection policy being the driver of labor market success, racial discrimination likely plays the largest role in determining Ethiopian (black) African immigrants’ labor market incorporation in both places.

Is there any merit to the merit‐based immigration system? What Sub‐Saharan African immigrant labor and housing market outcomes tell us about U.S. economic and immigration systems

AbstractFor decades, U.S. immigration policy debates have centered on creating a merit‐based system limiting entry to high‐skilled immigrants. Yet the emphasis on merit‐based immigration ignores the fact that high‐skilled immigrants already enter the United States in merit‐based immigration assume high‐skilled immigrants benefit the U.S. economy because they are better able than low‐skilled immigrants to translate skills into economic success. Using Sub‐Saharan (Black) African immigrants' labor and housing market outcomes, I show that meritocracy only partially explains U.S. labor and housing outcomes, leaving a merit‐based system unlikely to address America's economic needs. The majority of immigrants to the U.S. are non‐White, and racial discrimination in the labor market results in occupational and wage disadvantages in the U.S. Due to the public charge rule, high skilled immigrants may be less likely to get their visas renewed or green card applications approved because of these labor market disadvantages. Without stable visa status, high‐skilled immigrants will be less likely to make long‐term economic investments in the United States—an important way of contributing to the U.S. economy. Together, research indicates that U.S. immigration reform will not work without first enacting policy addressing racial disparities in economic systems.

Afro-diasporic Experiences of Highly Skilled Black African Immigrants in Australia

ABSTRACT This study explored the experiences of skilled African immigrants in Australia. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 27 individuals from different sub-Saharan African countries currently residing in South Australia. The findings report on the experiences of change, cultural identity, diasporic identities, employment, negotiating family dynamics, and the experiences of racial discrimination in Australia. These findings call for considerations that address these inequities, including culturally sensitive practice by social services, employers, and the wider society. Understanding the experiences of African migrants in Australia is particularly relevant for decolonised, critical social work practice, which takes the emphasis away from an individual’s ability to cope by examining how social environments shape such experiences. IMPLICATIONS Advocacy to address racism and discrimination towards African migrants in Australia is necessary. Fostering support for African migrants as they develop a diasporic identity and adapt to changes in family dynamics is encouraged. Developing culturally sensitive social support services for African immigrants is necessary for integration.

SEARCHING FOR THEORETICAL AGENCY: TOWARDS A BLACK AFRICAN IMMIGRANT STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

This article describes the theoretical construction of a Black African Immigrant Standpoint Epistemology (BAISE). BAISE is an emerging system of thought that seeks and locates the souls of Black African immigrants, re-centers their conceptions of knowledge, and describes their theory of action. Such an epistemology is critical as a tool for Black African immigrants to more effectively express their theoretical agency and construct an alternative form of knowledge that accounts for the totality of their experiences and their social realities. The article first describes the key tenets of several conceptual frameworks that have been appropriated and reconfigured to provide the conceptual foundations of BAISE. These core components are interwoven together to capture the complexity of the experiences and the realities of Black African immigrants and create a tapestry of concepts and knowledges providing the epistemological context for BAISE. Among the many coeval and complementary theories of knowledge available, theories that focus on agency and the construction of realities, on the valorization of previously discredited and discounted epistemological alternatives, as well as on the deconstruction of the positionality of Black African immigrants on the racialized checkerboard and on the re-centering of the marginalized and oppressed lives have seeded the emergence of BAISE. The second major section of this article presents the initial theoretical development of BAISE. The conceptualization process describes how the marginalized status of Black African immigrants shapes their identities and perspectives on the world.

SEARCHING FOR THEORETICAL AGENCY: TOWARDS A BLACK AFRICAN IMMIGRANT STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGY

This article describes the theoretical construction of a Black African Immigrant Standpoint Epistemology (BAISE). BAISE is an emerging system of thought that seeks and locates the souls of Black African immigrants, re-centers their conceptions of knowledge, and describes their theory of action. Such an epistemology is critical as a tool for Black African immigrants to more effectively express their theoretical agency and construct an alternative form of knowledge that accounts for the totality of their experiences and their social realities. The article first describes the key tenets of several conceptual frameworks that have been appropriated and reconfigured to provide the conceptual foundations of BAISE. These core components are interwoven together to capture the complexity of the experiences and the realities of Black African immigrants and create a tapestry of concepts and knowledges providing the epistemological context for BAISE. Among the many coeval and complementary theories of knowledge available, theories that focus on agency and the construction of realities, on the valorization of previously discredited and discounted epistemological alternatives, as well as on the deconstruction of the positionality of Black African immigrants on the racialized checkerboard and on the re-centering of the marginalized and oppressed lives have seeded the emergence of BAISE. The second major section of this article presents the initial theoretical development of BAISE. The conceptualization process describes how the marginalized status of Black African immigrants shapes their identities and perspectives on the world.

Racial Microaggressions at Work: Reflections from Black African Professionals in Australia

Abstract Theorising how race and Africanness intersect in the professional lives of African immigrants can provide a nuanced understanding of how racial identities shape the professional identities of Black Africans in Australia. This article is contextualised within a larger study that sought to explore the Afro-diasporic experiences of highly skilled Black African immigrants in South Australia. Particularly, it examines how Black African professionals experience their workplace. Data were collected through face-to-face semi-structured interviews with twenty-seven Black African professionals in South Australia. The findings from this study reveal that the often-accepted narrative of race-free workplaces is not one that is supported by Black African immigrants’ experiences, as they report constant, subtle and covert patterns of racial microaggressions in the workplace. Utilising critical race theories, this article makes the invisibility of microaggressions visible by probing how the Black body is worn as a burden in the workplace, which consequently produces psychological distress and racial battle fatigue. This study will provide social work practitioners with a critical understanding of the various challenges facing African professionals in the workplace, and how processes of racialisation at work may impact on psychological safety in this environment.

Boundaries of Belonging: Theorizing Black African Migrant Experiences in Australia.

As nationalist ideologies intensify in Australia, so do the experiences of ‘everyday racism’ and exclusion for Black African immigrants. In this article, we utilize critical theories and engage with colonial histories to contextualize Afrodiasporic experiences in Australia, arguing that the conditional acceptance of Black bodies within Australian spaces is contingent upon the status quo of the white hegemony. The tropes and discourses that render the bodies of Black African migrants simultaneously invisible and hyper-visible indicate that immigration is not only a movement of bodies, but also a phenomenon solidly tied to global inequality, power, and the abjection of blackness. Drawing on critical race perspectives and theories of belonging, we highlight through use of literature how Black Africans in Australia are constructed as ‘perpetual strangers’. As moral panics and discourses of hyper-criminality are summoned, the bordering processes are also simultaneously co-opted to reinforce scrutiny and securitization, with significant implications for social cohesion, belonging and public health.

Constructing multilingua franca scales

Using notions of scale and space, this study explores how Black African immigrants (BAIs) experience communication and negotiate, shape and reshape their social identities through language use in Johannesburg (South Africa) – a city characterised not only by complex multilingualism but also by quotidian violence. Drawing from qualitative interviews and group discussions, an analysis of BAIs’ metalinguistic discourses on their communicative practices as they move across spaces suggests that they view Johannesburg as a layered space characterised by dissimilar scales of interaction. Utilising negotiation strategies predicated on variegated scales, BAIs make space for home and host nation language varieties using forms that function as ‘multilingua francas,’ thereby resisting and unsettling the dominant local scales based on regimented ethnolinguistic boundaries.

Immigrant Men’s Labour Market Incorporation in South Africa: Regional and National Origin Differences

AbstractThis study explores the process of labour market incorporation among migrant men in South Africa, which has become a magnet for regional immigration in recent decades. Using 2011 Census data, we compare the employment rates, class of worker, occupation and income of black African immigrants, by region of origin, to black South African‐born internal migrants, and examine how these outcomes are associated with various forms of human capital. Results show that, overall, immigrant men enjoy higher employment levels compared to internal migrants. However, this immigrant employment advantage does not extend into other labour market outcomes. Immigrant men are over‐represented in the informal sector, which contributes to generally lower income relative to South Africans. The returns to education are also markedly lower for immigrants than for their internal migrant counterparts. Results also highlight variations across regional and national origin groups, with better‐resourced groups exhibiting more favourable outcomes than longer‐established but lower‐skilled co‐ethnic communities.

Reverse Inclusion: Black Francophones in the Interface between Anti-Black Racism and Linguicism.

In this article, I contend that first generation of Black African Francophone immigrants in Canada regress through the three phases of immigration, which are settlement, adaptation, and integration. This plight occurs while immigrants ought to be progressing from a phase of immigration to a succeeding one. It is generated by linguicism and anti-Black racism that afflict Black Francophones. Settlement is largely successful, adaption is largely a failure, while integration is completely a failure. This critical analysis problematizes a quandary about Canada and paves the way for implementing mechanism to improve the inclusion of Black Francophones.

Metalinguistic discourses on translanguaging and multimodality

Abstract This article explores metalinguistic discourses of black African immigrants (BAIs) in Johannesburg on how they mobilize multilingual and multimodal resources in their communicative practices to pass as South Africans (SAs), concealing their identities as non-SAs to avert violent xenophobic attacks. Drawing data from semi-structured interviews and group discussions with BAIs, the article investigates how BAIs report on creatively, strategically using translanguaging and multimodality in performance of ingroup membership as local black SAs, blurring the boundaries between “outsiders” and “insiders.” BAIs use passing as a social identity management strategy, to negotiate their putative identity and resist ascription of the foreigner-outsider categorization and attendant social meanings. Besides language(s), BAIs use modes of corporeal practice (embodiment, clothing semiosis, skin-bleaching) as legitimating markers of belonging. The article argues that using passing unsettles the distinction between local/insider/citizen and migrant/outsider/non-citizen – concepts framed around a nation-state – revealing tensions, contradictions, and complexities in the politics of identity in Johannesburg.

Home Sweet Home: Understanding the Geographies of Return Migration Intentions among Black Continental African Immigrants in Canada

Until the 1990s, scholars of international migration generally assumed that most immigrants from the global South make a permanent move to settle in rich countries and thereby sever ties with their homelands. More recently, however, a burgeoning literature has emerged on the transnational and return migration experience of immigrants, with several analysts touting the benefits of these trends to the socioeconomic development of countries of origin, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. Still, only a few studies have examined the factors that influence immigrants’ return migration intentions, and fewer still (if any at all) have analyzed how these factors play out in the context of Black continental Africans in Canada. Moreover, only a handful of studies have examined the utility of geographic factors in the decisions of Black continental African immigrants to return, or not to return, to their homelands. This theoretical paper explores the interconnections between return migration intentions, immigrant integration and transnationalism, focusing primarily on Black continental Africans in Canada.