Leslie Purnell Assimilation April 20, 2012 When they first come to America, the majority of refugees live in a large city. For instance, the majority of Nepalis reside in Atlanta, NYC, San Francisco, and D.C. There they can go to organizations that help them get familiar with how American society works. The population in big cities can be very overwhelming to a new resident of the United States. Therefore it is also very easy to get lost and feel ignored by the everyday people. The organizations set up a system in which refugees gradually become assimilated into the American Culture. One of the main topics of study in the organizations is ESL. The implications for ESL are to help refugees or other immigrants learn the American history/culture. Essentially these organizations imply that if someone comes to America and wants to live here then they should learn all they can to help them survive in this country. They are implying that people of all cultures would want to learn about the American culture and how others exist in it. This is how assimilation works. There is not a focus on how to find a happy medium between their culture and the American culture. The organizations simply just teach the “American” way. Here is a little information about the refugees that I have been working with. This will also give a picture of what other refugees might have gone through, and worse, before coming to America: Oppression has played a huge role in the Nepali’s history. Ever since the 1980’s Bhutan’s king and the Druk became worried about the fast growing population of the Lhotsampa’s. So the Bhutanese made new laws and basically pushed Nepali’s out of their land. Books were burned, citizenship, and civil rights were taken away. They had to sign voluntary migration certificates, and were eventually expelled
from the country. Ever since Bhutan has not let a single refugee back. The refugees do not want to part with their families so many would rather live like refugees instead of starting a new life in America. The Nepali refugees are not well known in mainstream culture. There has not been a lot of mainstream coverage on their immigration to the U.S. When they come over here they are not seen as competent in the American culture because they do not know how to speak English well, let alone read it. They have trouble finding jobs that will take a chance and hire them because they will not understand the customers. Mainstream basically knows nothing about the Nepali culture therefore they do not exist of have a problem with living in America. Assimilation has that type of attitude such as if you do not want to learn our way, have fun standing out in a crowd. People must adapt and take on the new culture in order to essentially make it and live in that particular society. The word refugee can have multiple definitions depending on the country a person lives. Not all refugees are the same, and just because 2 refugees fled from the same country does not mean they had similar experiences. Social identity plays a huge role in how a refugee comes to accept their new life in a different country. (Czarniawska & Wolff, 1998) stated, “If . . . one leaves to live in another culture, the previously stable identity vanishes at once, since the new audience does not recognize the cues and a new identity must be built.” Part of everyone’s’ identity is socially constructed. When a refugee goes to another country where they have had no previous encounters with the refugees’ identities before, it can cause the psychological mindset of the refuge to become confused and frustrated. After moving to a new country, the refugee struggles between their past and future identity. “In certain cultures, personal identity is defined by
family, community, and social networks rather than by individual accomplishments and needs; this generates an emphasis on interdependence. Paradoxically, members of many refugee groups may perceive being individually oriented and independent as counter to their cultural values. As a result, standard Wester clinical interventions are frequently in conflict with refugees’ fundamental belief and value systems� (Bemak & Chung, 2002). This is why it is important to assess a refugees’ psychological state in the beginning, and to help find a way where the refugee can live happily. Before coming to America, refugees have experienced death of loved ones, wars, rape, and other acts that unbearable to think of. All refugees have different experiences and hardships when they move to a new country. (Chung, Bemak, & Okazaki, 1997) stated that older refugees may experience more difficulties than younger refugees in adjusting to new and foreign environments that require them to learn new languages, skills, and patterns of behavior. This could be due to the fact that older refugees have already established their role in their old society and are reluctant to give that status up. Learning a new way of life can seem overwhelming and a lot of work for someone who has already lived half of their life. There was also a study conducted by (Bronstein & Montgomery, 2011) that reported a large number of refugee children are very resilient to adversity. When children have something so traumatic happen so early on in their life, it is often hard for them to accept the past is the past and move on. Especially when they have might be dealing with depression, anxiety, PTSD, or loss of a loved one. Refugee women and girls are also susceptible to mental health problems, in part because rape and sexual abuse that occurred during the premigration period (Refugee Women in Development, 1990). Some women have also become newly widowed or have
dealt with the loss of a child. Since certain refugees have different experiences, just checking the refugees’ state of mind as soon as they arrive in the new country is not enough. (Odejide, 2006; Robertson, Halcon, Savik et al., 2006) reported that valid and reliable assessment of refugees’ mental health and wellbeing should not be considered as an end in itself. Experiences of clients from refugee back- grounds, or of clients who have been internally displaced within their own national borders by war or by political, cultural or religious persecution, quite frequently involve direct exposure to traumatic events, including torture, loss of family and loved ones and witnessing violence and murder. Exposure to these types of trauma, in turn, has been linked with other lost opportunities and negative outcomes such as substance abuse, physical health problems, educational underperformance, illiteracy and lower incomes. Adaption plays a key role in assimilation and acculturation. The refugee should be able to feel as if they are able to make the new world their home. Many factors play a part in order for someone outside of their comfort zone to be welcoming. (Bemak & Chung, 2002) declared, the degree of adaption differs according to cultural and individual characteristics in the ability to integrate the culture of origin with the culture of relocation. Successful acculturation is influence by several important factors, including the individual’s desire and willingness to adapt, his or her ability to identify with a new reference group, his or her acceptance of the host culture’s norms and values, the support the individual has from social and family networks, and resolution of past psychological trauma. Learning the traditions, beliefs, and values of a new country is an obstacle that all refugees face. Another main obstacle to assimilation and acculturation is the language barrier.
Many of the refugee settlement programs offer classes and workshops to help teach the native language. While offering how to speak the native language, some programs do not steps in guiding the refugees how to learn the new ways of the country, but still find a way to include their old culture into the new one. The organizations often only teach information about the new country, and it is up to the refugees to use that information anyway they would like. There is not a lot of guidance in what the refugees can do in the new country using their old lifestyle. (Bemak & Chung, 2002) relayed that programs teaching English as a second language in the United States offer language training, but fall short of providing a holistic perspective; that is, they do not attend to issues that emerge with cultural language acquisition. For refugees, learning a new language may symbolize abandoning their homelands and may be a catalyst for feelings of cultural identity loss. Not knowing the native language when a refugee goes to a new country is another set back in education and finding employment. Depending on where the refugees came from, their education level can vary either a little or a lot from the new country. It could even be that some of their education may not transfer over to the new curriculum. Qualifications and certification is also a problem, because what was legit over in the native land might not measure up to the requirements wherever they moved to. In the more developed countries, education is the building block for many organizations. The companies will require a certain amount of education level accomplishment, and that is when transferring of documents can get tricky. Another complication some refugees face when looking for employment is the fact that the job they once held in their country of origin may not be applicable to the skills they need in more technologically advanced societies. Downward occupational
mobility may be especially painful for refugee men and women who had achieved professional status in their countries of origin but encounter barriers to licensure and credentialing in their resettlement countries, in addition to the usual fluctuations of the competitive employment market (Bemak & Chung, 2002). When a refugee is not able to find employment that best suits their lifestyle and family, naturally it will be harder for the refugee to feel a sense of belonging in the new country. Not knowing their role in society is troublesome and can cause strain in the acculturation or assimilation process. During the acculturation process a refugee is lead to pick and choose the traditions they can’t live without, and learn how to blend their traditions in with the new culture of the resettlement country. Clearly this is a difficult experience because the refugees have already gone through so much in life, and now they have to drop some of their traditions as well to try and fit in with the new society. The second option the refugees have is to make a fresh clean start and forget about their past culture and traditions and adopt the new country’s as their own. Refugee resettlement organizations essentially teach the assimilation aspect. If a refugee is reluctant to adapt to the new culture then they will not thrive in society. There is no way in the developed countries that they want an employee who has broken English, does not dress professionally, and uneducated. This can be a hard pill for the refugees to swallow and takes a long period of time to get used to. Regardless if they are a man or woman, old or young, have parents or orphaned coming into a new country will take a long time to get accustomed to. The subjects of assimilation and acculturation have had a great deal of research conducted to better understand these concepts in various situations. With continuing research,
hopefully better organizations and courses will be designed to help refugees find a happy medium of who they once were and who they will become.
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