Diverse Migrants Research Articles

Settlement Service Literacy and the Relationship Between Service Utilisation and Wellbeing Among Newly Arrived Migrants: A Mixed Methods Systematic Review Protocol

Background: Settlement service literacy refers to the ability of migrants to access, understand and critically navigate settlement services. In Australia, increasing numbers of culturally and linguistically diverse migrants require settlement services to assist their transition. However, there are barriers to migrant’s ability to utilise settlement services which are related to their level of settlement service literacy. This review aims to shed light on how settlement service literacy influences new migrant’s utilisation of settlement services, and the consequences that it has for health, well-being and sense of belonging.
 Methods: The review will follow the guidelines laid out by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA). Literature searches will be undertaken in CINAHL, EMBASE, PubMed, PsycINFO, Scopus, Web of Science, Sociological Abstracts, SocIndex, ProQuest Social Science Database, and Google Scholar. Grey literature and relevant government bodies, non-government organisations, service providers and research institutes will also be searched. Studies included will report primary data (qualitative and quantitative) on new migrant’s (under five years) ability to utilise settlement services in high income countries. Studies that meet the inclusion criteria will be imported to Covidence, two researchers will screen the studies in a two part process (title and introduction scan; and full text) for relevance. Data extracted will include general publication information (author, country, year, and publication), type of study, participants, type of settlement service, measured outcomes, and the study aims, methods and results. Finally, data will be synthesised using a narrative approach.
 Discussion: The review will provide insight into the relationship between settlement service literacy and service utilisation and wellbeing for new migrants. The review will also provide data to inform settlement service policy to better cater for the needs of migrants.
 Systematic review registration:This protocol has been submitted to international prospective register of systematic reviews and meta-analysis (PROSPERO) and is currently under review.

Transnational History and Colonial Records: Locating Bengali Mobility in the British Malaya

By the late 1980s, some historians began to identify their works as transnational history – which dealt with the past human mobility, and the circulation of goods, information, and ideas across the globe. Colonial records are an essential source for reconstructing transnational history. However, some of the colonial census-makers were not aware of the racial identity of transmigrants during the population enumeration. They categorised the transmigrants under different umbrella heads, and due to their stringent systems of cataloguing, the identity of diverse migrants was misplaced or generalised in census reports. Therefore, these certain ambiguities complicate the reconstruction of the transnational history of some specific migrant communities. With the impact of British colonialism in present-day South and Southeast Asia, South Asian multi-ethnic people, including Bengalis, migrated to Malaya. Initially, the British colonial administrators categorised the South Asian multi-racial migrants under different heads including “Bengalis & c.”, “Tamils & c.” and “Indians”. These umbrella terms in colonial records create problems in reconstructing the transnational history of anyone specific race from South Asia, such as the Bengali. Through a reinterpretation of colonial documents, empirical evidence, and oral interviews, this paper attempts to locate the Bengali migrants in British Malaya.

Oral health needs of older migrants with culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds in developed countries: A systematic review.

To identify and synthesise the available evidence regarding the oral health needs of and the oral health promotion provided for older, cultural and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants in developed countries. Databases were searched using search terms to identify all relevant English-language research studies published between 2000 and January 2018. Thirty-nine articles met the review criteria. Thirty-three papers reported on the oral health needs of CALD older migrants and 6 on oral health programs provided for older migrants. Cultural and linguistically diverse older migrants have high oral health needs and poor oral status and face a variety of barriers in accessing oral health care in their host countries. Recommendations to improve their access to oral health programs include building transcultural dental training into the educational requirements of dental students and developing oral health promotion programs that include culturally and linguistically customised information.

Community-based participatory health research: principles and practice

Abstract Community-based participatory research (CBPR) is a collaborative approach to research that aims to improve the health of marginalized communities and reduce health disparities. It starts with a topic of concern for the community and involves iterative cycles of action and reflection to initiate change. Community members are involved as partners and trained as peer researchers to take an active role in the research process. Processes of capacity building and empowerment play a prominent role. As a general principle, participatory research does not primarily focus on health problems, but pays at least equal attention to the resources and capacities of communities. It places a strong focus on developing trust and reciprocity in research relationships. Regarding methodology, various empirical research methods are used in CBPR study designs, including qualitative, quantitative, mixed-methods and arts-based methods. Arts-based methods such as photovoice, digital storytelling, mapping and drawings facilitate the expression of lived experience, including sensitive aspects, through creative verbal and non-verbal means. These methods expand the available means of expression and as such are highly valuable in research fields where verbal communication is challenged by language barriers and diverse cultural backgrounds as well as sensitive topics and experiences. Participatory health research has been conducted with diverse migrant and refugee groups internationally. Due to legal and other reasons, refugees may be limited in their capacities for participation. The presentation will discuss the strengths and limitations of CBPR including structural obstacles to equitable partnerships.

Transitions from education to employment for culturally and linguistically diverse migrants and refugees in settlement contexts: what do we know?

ABSTRACT Access to and experiences of education among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Migrants or Refugees (CALDM/R) is a site of increased scholarly interest. While research emphasises new CALDM/Rs’ desire to work and meaningfully contribute to their new country, many remain under employed even though many hold multiple tertiary qualifications. This article offers an interpretive review of literature relating to the higher education and employment experiences of CALDM/R, so as to contribute to debates about how universities should facilitate the pathways from university to employment for these students. From our reading of the literature, we argue that current policy fails to address areas of language proficiency, work experience and recognition of work and study from countries overseas, all of which contribute to high levels of unemployment. This review also highlights structural workplace issues of racism, discrimination and exploitation and discussed the role and responsibility of universities in contributing to the employment outcomes for CALDM/R. It concludes that as tertiary education providers have a commitment to ensuring their graduates are ‘job ready’, particular attention to the needs of CALDM/R is required.

Working to end farmworker oppression while listening to farmworkers and focusing on root causes in context

In this paper, we respond to Leigh Binford’s excellent article “Assessing Temporary Foreign Worker Programs through the Prism of Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program: Can They be Reformed or Should They be Eliminated?” We offer three clarifying points to Binford’s article. First, in this time of widespread and increasingly aggressive racism and nationalism, we are concerned that calls for closing borders (including the discontinuation of TFWPs) may play further into these violent divisions. Second, TFWPs are not apparatuses that can be extricated from the larger context of transnational racialized capitalism, and ending them would not end the exploitation Binford rightly criticizes within them. Third, we—academics, activists, non-migrants, and non-farmworkers—should pay attention especially to what diverse migrants and farmworkers prioritize, think, say, and do in relation to these programs and in relation to their own well-being more generally. Finally, we highlight union work that has been listening to, and collaborating with, immigrant workers to help them make certain demands of the state normally outside the purview of TFWPs.

Local Ambivalence to Diverse Mobilities – The Case of a Norwegian Rural Village

AbstractIn Norway, immigration and tourism have become important drivers of diversity in rural communities. While rural migration mostly has been studied from the migrants’ perspective, this article examines how long‐term residents in a Norwegian rural mountain resort characterised by seasonal tourism and labour immigration experience the flux of diverse migrants and how this affects them and the local community. The article is based on 12 interviews with men and women who are long‐term community residents. A major narrative of the locals is that of the village and its inhabitants as accustomed to mobility, a local knowledge acquired through decades of tourism and in‐migration. But there are also narratives of ambivalence and contradictions and of the place as saturated by mobilities. The article explores how locals adjust to and avoid these mobilities.

Skilled Migrants and Negotiations: New Identities, Belonging, Home and Settlement

ABSTRACTIssues of identity, home and belonging underline most transnational and transmigrational experiences. Globally, there is increasing interest in issues related to the settlement of migrants; yet there is growing evidence on a quotidian basis that migrant settlement into a host country is not a smooth experience. Drawing on qualitative empirical work, involving a large cross section of ethnically diverse skilled migrants located in a regional Australian centre, this article explores the issue of settlement through considering how the concepts of identity, belonging, settlement and home are presented in narrative accounts from skilled migrants to Australia. Intersectional theoretical frameworks are used to explore migrants’ perceptions of identity, belonging and home in negotiating and realising their new settlement. This also helps highlight the differences in skilled and non-skilled experiences using visa status, gender, education, ethnicity and socio-economic status/class to conduct an intersectional analysis.

Unity in Diversity? How Intergroup Contact Can Foster Nation Building

We use a population resettlement program in Indonesia to identify long-run effects of intergroup contact on national integration. In the 1980s, the government relocated two million ethnically diverse migrants into hundreds of new communities. We find greater integration in fractionalized communities with many small groups, as measured by national language use at home, intermarriage, and children’s name choices. However, in polarized communities with a few large groups, ethnic attachment increases and integration declines. Residential segregation dampens these effects. Social capital, public goods, and ethnic conflict follow similar patterns. Overall, our findings highlight the importance of localized contact in shaping identity. (JEL D63, J12, J15, J18, O15, R23, Z13)

Nation-building Through Compulsory Schooling during the Age of Mass Migration

AbstractWhy did America introduce compulsory schooling laws at a time when financial investments in education and voluntary school attendance were high? We provide qualitative and quantitative evidence that states adopted compulsory schooling laws as a nation-building tool to instil civic values to the culturally diverse migrants during the ‘Age of Mass Migration’ between 1850 and 1914. We show the adoption of compulsory schooling laws occurred significantly earlier in states that hosted European migrants with lower exposure to civic values in their home countries. Using cross-county data, we show that these migrants had significantly lower demand for American schooling pre-compulsion.

Migrant Integration and Cultural Capital in the Context of Sport and Physical Activity: a Systematic Review

The belief that participation in sport and physical activity assists the integration of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants is prominent within sport policy and programming. Integration outcomes may be enhanced when the migrant develops facets of cultural capital that are valued by both the migrant and the destination country. This paper systematically examines the cultural capital of CALD migrants in the context of participation in sport and physical activity. Databases were searched for papers published in peer-reviewed journals between 1990 and 2016. A total of 3040 articles were identified and screened, and 45 papers were included in this review. Findings show that migrants’ cultural capital can be both an asset to, and a source of exclusion from, sport participation. Sport and physical activity are sites where migrant-specific cultural capital is (re)produced, where new forms of cultural capital that are valued in the destination society are generated, and where cultural capital is negotiated in relation to the dominant culture. The authors conclude that the analytical lens of cultural capital enables an in-depth understanding of the interplay between migrant agency and structural constraints, and of integration as a two-way process of change and adaptation, in the context of sport and physical activity.

4.3-O7When pain means more than pain: the intersectional experiences of living with chronic pain among culturally and linguistically diverse migrant and refugee communities in Australia

4.3-O7When pain means more than pain: the intersectional experiences of living with chronic pain among culturally and linguistically diverse migrant and refugee communities in Australia

The role of VET in the (dis)placing of migrants’ skills in Australia

Vocational Education and Training (VET) in a policy and institutional sense plays an important role in the migration experiences of people who settle in Australia. This article draws on qualitative empirical work using narrative accounts from VET practitioners along with a cross section of ethnically diverse migrants to reveal how race and ethnicity are central to and constitutive of the experiences of both humanitarian and skilled migrants in Australian VET. The article employs critical race theory (CRT) building on research developed by others in the Journal of VET to analyse these experiences and the role of VET and labour markets in this process of (dis)placing migrants’ skills. The article argues firstly, that skilled migrants are not absent in VET, but are rather rendered invisible in a policy sense. Secondly, CRT provides a theoretical resource for coming to grips with how, in a marketised Australian VET context where institutional responses to skilled migration can either be beneficial or exploitative, practices privilege advantaged groups and are always at once culturally loaded.

An examination of responses to surveys among Filipino-Australian migrants.

Background Surveys are frequently used to collect data. Although paper surveys are commonly used, online surveys are gaining in popularity, with the inclusion of open-ended questions (OEQs) allowing respondents to freely express their views. Little is known about how Filipino-Australian migrants respond to surveys. There is some concern about the usefulness of OEQs administered to culturally and linguistically diverse migrants, who may have limited capacity to articulate their thoughts in writing. Aim To examine the responses of Filipino-Australian migrants to a survey. Discussion A total of 552 respondents were recruited, of whom 428 (78%) completed the questionnaire online. The overall response rate to the OEQs was 69%, with higher completion rates among those given a paper-based questionnaire and those with university educations. Conclusion Filipino migrants with functional English language skills responded well to the online survey. Paper-based administration elicited more OEQ responses, which is attributed to greater interaction between participants and researchers. Those with university educations may have more capacity to express themselves in English and were therefore more likely to complete the OEQs. Implications for practice The high response rate obtained in this study suggests that among Filipino-Australian migrants who rated their English language skills and educational level highly, the translation of OEQs may not be necessary. This has important implications for resources in research. Face-to-face interaction between participants and researchers is an important strategy for increasing the rates of response to OEQs.

Understanding Ethnic Residential Cluster Formation: new perspectives from South Australia’s migrant hostels

ABSTRACTThroughout Australia’s history, successive governments have lamented the clustering of non-English-speaking migrants in ‘ethnic enclaves’ or ‘ghettos’. From the early Chinatowns of the 1800s till today, urban concentrations of ethnic groups have raised concerns and fears in local populations and authorities alike, despite decades of international research which suggests that ethnic residential clusters actually aid long-term assimilation and adjustment. Many of the ethnic residential clusters in contemporary Australia have been claimed to be a direct consequence of the migrant hostels and reception centres which operated between 1948 and the 1990s. This paper traces migrant settlement patterns in South Australia in rich detail, revealing the complexities of lived experiences that shape migrant settlement decisions. Against the background of public and scholarly debates over ‘ethnic enclaves’, and drawing on quantitative and qualitative historical research on the lived experiences of former hostel migrants, it analyses how migrant hostels and reception centres contributed to the settlement experiences of diverse migrants. We conclude that migrant hostels were just one among various factors that led to the growth and maintenance of ethnic residential clusters.

Exploratory insights into the financial habits of CALD migrants

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to explore the financial habits and experience of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants via a case study of first and second wave migrants from the Vietnamese community in Australia.Design/methodology/approach– This paper utilises a qualitative approach through semi-structured interviews. A thematic analysis was adopted when coding the interview data which led to the emergence of identified themes related to financial habits and experience.Findings– The findings reveal that first and second wave migrants shared similar views on seeking professional financial advice, but not on the use of community-based financial schemes. When asked about the potential benefits of attending financial education workshops to inform themselves of financial services, most were unwilling to attend.Research limitations/implications– Although the research targets first and second wave Vietnamese CALD migrants, no claims can be made regarding the representation of CALD migrants as a whole. The research has implications with respect to the perceived necessity of CALD migrants to utilise mainstream financial services. This paper provides recommendations for future research in this area.Originality/value– The paper provides one of the few studies of an Australian CALD migrant cohort with respect to financial habits. The paper also provides an understanding of the cultural barriers and challenges facing this specific cohort of the Vietnamese community in Australia with respect to potentially accessing financial services.

Religious diversity in primary schools: reflections from the Republic of Ireland

Growing secularisation of the population and the arrival of new culturally and religiously diverse migrants are posing new challenges to schools in the Republic of Ireland (Ireland). These challenges are particularly acute in Irish primary schools, the majority of which are under Catholic patronage. Recent changes have necessitated an extensive consultation process about how to accommodate religious diversity and have resulted in some important policy changes. This article contributes to an ongoing debate about state-run denominational schools and the place of Religious Education in these. While set in the Irish context, the article is also relevant for educators and academics in other jurisdictions as it describes recent policy developments and steps taken in addressing cultural and religious diversity in schools.

Improving access to health information for older migrants by using grounded theory and social network analysis to understand their information behaviour and digital technology use.

Migrant well-being can be strongly influenced by the migration experience and subsequent degree of mainstream language acquisition. There is little research on how older Culturally And Linguistically Diverse (CALD) migrants who have 'aged in place' find health information, and the role which digital technology plays in this. Although the research for this paper was not focused on cancer, we draw out implications for providing cancer-related information to this group. We interviewed 54 participants (14 men and 40 women) aged 63-94 years, who were born in Italy or Greece, and who migrated to Australia mostly as young adults after World War II. Constructivist grounded theory and social network analysis were used for data analysis. Participants identified doctors, adult children, local television, spouse, local newspaper and radio as the most important information sources. They did not generally use computers, the Internet or mobile phones to access information. Literacy in their birth language, and the degree of proficiency in understanding and using English, influenced the range of information sources accessed and the means used. The ways in which older CALD migrants seek and access information has important implications for how professionals and policymakers deliver relevant information to them about cancer prevention, screening, support and treatment, particularly as information and resources are moved online as part of e-health.

The association between ethnicity (culturally and linguistically diverse migrants) and the time taken in seeking medical care for chest pain: a systematic review protocol

REVIEW QUESTION/OBJECTIVE The objective of this review is to determine if there is an association between ethnicity and delay in seeking medical care for chest pain among culturally and linguistically diverse migrants. INCLUSION CRITERIA Types of participants This review will consider studies that include migrants with different ethnic backgrounds who present with chest pain at an emergency department. The review will exclude participants who: 1. were born locally, 2. are indigenous populations. These populations will be excluded in order to determine them as the general population. Types of exposure This review will consider studies that evaluated the effects of ethnicity that may have contributed to delay in seeking medical care for chest pain among culturally and linguistically diverse migrants compare to the delay in local populations. The review will look at the delay time between onset of symptoms and hospital arrival. Types of outcomes This review will consider studies that include time in seeking medical care for chest pain as an outcome measure. The time will be measured as the interval between the time of symptom onset and time to reach emergency department.

Developing an Acculturation and Resilience Scale for Use with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Populations

Australian multicultural society consists of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants, refugees, and international students from different parts of the world. Despite hardships, these individuals show resilience and adapt successfully. However, there is a dearth of scales measuring these positive developments and personal strengths. The study describes the development and evaluation of a scale measuring resilience and acculturation of CALD people. Items were generated for the Acculturation and Resilience Scale (AARS). The AARS and other acculturation and psychological distress scales were administered to 225 CALD community members. Exploratory factor analyses resulted in a 27‐item AARS with three subscales: Acculturation, Resilience, and Spirituality. The three‐factor structure was subjected to a confirmatory factor analysis on a sample of 515 international students. The factor structure stability was upheld by the second sample. The psychometric properties were investigated using the two samples and demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency, test–retest reliability, and divergent validity. The scale addresses a major gap in the literature and can be used to measure the positive acculturation and resilience of the newly arrived and relocated individuals. Further research is warranted to examine the scale's psychometric properties with migrants and refugees from a range of ethnic communities.