“Since the early 2000s, Canadian federal policies have encouraged Francophone immigration from around the world in order to support the vitality of the French language in Francophone minority communities outside the province of Quebec. As a consequence, these communities can no longer be associated solely with white European settlers and their descendants; they are now multicultural, multiethnic, and polyglot communities. This research proposes to bring together the voices of racialized French speakers of Vancouver. It will examine the variety of French spoken by young people of colour, as well as their sociolinguistic experiences in a predominantly white and French-speaking high school located in Vancouver.
Vancouver is a diverse metropolis, with 49 percent of the population identifying as people of colour. French-speaking immigrants in Vancouver do arrive from Europe, but also from many former French colonies in Africa and the Caribbean, where French is an official language. These French-speaking immigrants play an important role in (re)defining the variety of French spoken in British Columbia as they carve out new forms of identity and belonging. In the French schools of Vancouver, these different varieties of French come into contact with Canadian and European varieties (which are generally perceived as more prestigious). However, no studies have focused on these diverse young people’s linguistic practices and the contribution they make to the variety of French spoken in British Columbia. This project expands the scope of existing scholarship by focusing on an understudied variety of French, spoken by a population that is also underrepresented in the (socio)linguistic and anthropological literature. In addition to contributing crucial knowledge to our understanding of language contact and emerging varieties of French in Canada, this project takes a race-centered approach to language and identity by taking into consideration the range of ways race shapes the children of immigrants’ experiences.”
This project is funded by SSHRC (Insight Development Grant).
“How has exposure to COVID-19 affected prejudice and discrimination towards refugees and migrants? While there have been several early studies of individual attitudes and behaviors in response to the pandemic, this research has almost all been limited to advanced economies in the Global North. We know very little about the impact of COVID-19 on everyday life in the Global South, where weaker healthcare systems and preexisting inequalities likely exacerbate negative health, economic, and social outcomes. Our proposed study will examine whether Colombian citizens have shifted their attitudes towards migration.
For this study, we conduct a panel survey (pre- and during COVID-19) in Colombia. In fall 2019, we conducted face-to-face surveys with about 1,000 Colombians on their attitudes about Venezuelan migrants. In winter 2021, we re-interview the same respondents using computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI). We assess how their COVID exposure has changed their attitudes, especially in light of the additional strain presented by COVID-19 on public healthcare systems and other public services as well as on the labor market. ”
Research Partners
Yang-Yang Zhou, UBC
Margaret Peters, UBC
Danial Rojas Lozano, UBC
How does exposure to refugees affect politics, development, and citizen support for migration within the Global South? In the context of wealthy consolidated democracies, recent studies have found that when voters are more exposed to refugees, they punish incumbents and turn to far-right parties. Yet there is a dearth of studies on the electoral consequences of refugee hosting in developing countries — contexts in which politics often do not fall on a left-right partisan divide, the welfare state is under-developed, and refugees are more likely to be from similar cultural or ethnic groups. This is a serious omission, given that 85% of refugees and asylum seekers are hosted in the Global South, and that there are good reasons to expect that dynamics are different across contexts. We explore this question in Uganda, one of the largest refugee-hosting countries at 1.4 million. Combining information on the number and location of refugee settlements with four waves of national elections data at the parish level, we show that greater exposure to refugees increases electoral support for the incumbent. Unique longitudinal data on access to healthcare, schools, and roads coupled with national survey data suggest that this effect is due to positive externalities of refugee-hosting on public goods provision for surrounding host communities.
Research Partners
Yang-Yang Zhou, UBC
Guy Gross, UPenn
“Worldwide, large-scale conflicts and other situations of economic and environmental insecurity have led to unprecedented numbers of people migrating across international borders. Yet, many people experiencing the same crises choose to stay within their country of origin. This project seeks to understand how individuals in these insecure situations make decisions whether to migrate, where to settle if they decide to leave, and when to return home. While others have highlighted economic and safety considerations, this project focuses on internal values, such as dignity concerns and nationalism, that may influence this decision-making process. We examine how these values affect migration decisions within several different forced displacement crises, including the Syrian Civil War, the economic collapse of Venezuela, and the gang and domestic violence fueled migration out of Central America. Spanning multiple disciplines and across the sub-fields of political science, this research furthers understanding of how political dynamics shape individuals’ values and consequently, their migration decisions. We also study these issues in a range of different country contexts to help discern which decision-making considerations are universal and which are context specific. Large migration events can challenge the bureaucracies of even wealthy democracies like Canada, the U.S., and those in the E.U. For governments to effectively address these events, they need a better understanding of why forced and potential migrants make the decisions that they do.
This project is funded by the NSF.”
Research Partners
Yang-Yang Zhou, UBC
Margaret Peters, UCLA
“How does the presence of large migrant communities affect processes of national identity formation for nearby host citizens? If these host citizens share ethnic and cultural ties with the migrants, are they more accepting and inclusive of migrants, or do they seek to differentiate themselves by excluding or “”othering”” the migrants? Tackling these questions is critical, especially in light of the current displacement crisis. According to the UNHCR, there are now almost 80 million people forcibly displaced from their homes. Within the past decade, hosting migrants has become one of the most politically contentious issues throughout Europe and the U.S., which is reflected in the growing wave of scholarship on forced migration in these regions. Yet the vast majority of migrants fleeing crises, more than 85%, remain in the Global South, almost always in the border regions of a neighboring country. Unlike OECD countries, in these contexts, migrants are almost always located in the border regions of neighboring host countries, where they share cultural and ethnic ties with citizen groups living these areas. These citizen groups are also often considered ethnic minorities within their countries. We have much to learn about refugee-hosting dynamics in developing country contexts, which my research seeks to address.
My book project explores how the presence of refugees and other types of migrants affects the social and political identities and behaviors of nearby, often coethnic, citizens. Immigration scholars might predict that due to these coethnic ties, there would be less discrimination against and greater inclusion of migrants. Additionally, scholars of ethnic politics might expect these nearby citizen groups to feel greater ethnic as opposed to national identification, particularly since they are often marginalized by the state themselves. However, I theorize that the refugee hosting policies of the state and subsequently how the state and elites portray refugees will shape how nearby coethnic citizen groups will react.
This project has received funding from SSHRC and NSF. ”
Over the past two decades, populism has swept across the Global North, questioning the legitimacy of policymaking by established elites and framing immigrants as a threat to national identity and economic welfare. This project explores the impact of anti-immigration populism on bureaucratic organizations. The rise of anti-immigration populism challenges the legitimacy of bureaucracies responsible for immigration. It disturbs traditional immigration policymaking, the agreed upon goals of national immigration programs, and official state discourse on immigration. Yet, while much has been written on the impact of populism on parties and elected officials, its impact on bureaucratic organizations, and immigration bureaucracies more specifically, remains poorly understood.
Funded by a SSHRC Insight Grant, this project examines how comparatively powerful bureaucracies in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom have navigated policymaking in contexts that have been marked by anti-immigration populism since the early 2000s. In particular, this comparative study documents and compares how bureaucratic organizations responsible for immigration define and respond to the legitimacy challenges stemming from anti-immigration populism.
Research Partners
Antje Ellermann, Political Science; Director, UBC Centre for Migration Studies (Co-PI)
Mireille Paquet, Political Science, Concordia University (Co-PI)
This three-year, SSHRC-funded study responds to an urgent need to understand the implications of the increasing arrival, settlement and integration of racialized French-speaking immigrants and refugees for community cohesion in Canadian Francophone minority communities. Our ethnically diverse and bilingual research team (Drs. Suzanne Huot, Luisa Veronis, Leyla Sall, Nathalie Piquemal and Faiçal Zellama)will advance understandings of the relationship between French speakers’ intersectional identities and engagement in “collective occupations” (e.g., group activities) within 4 cities across Canada: Vancouver, Winnipeg, Ottawa, and Moncton.
Research Partners
Dr. Suzanne Huot, PI, UBC
Dr. Luisa Veronis, University of Ottawa
Dr. Leyla Sall, Université de Moncton
Dr. Nathalie Piquemal, UNiversity of Manitoba
Dr. Faiçal Zellama, Université de Saint-Boniface
This report analyzes, compares and contrasts the growing number of provincial legislative schemes aimed at addressing known recruitment and employment abuses of temporary foreign workers through registration and licensing schemes, with a view to identifying best practices and recommendations for further improvement that will enable the effective operationalization of these statutes and the realization of their core goals to protect temporary foreign workers in Canada.
This study examines the migration of Europeans and North Americans to Thailand for eldercare, and specifically dementia care. Based on ethnographic research at two centres in Chiang May and interviews with owners, managers, care staff and family members, we explore the factors that propel this migration, and the experiences of care in Thailand. One phase of the project involved working with a Berlin-based theatre company, Costa Compagnie, to create a theatre performance, staged in Berlin and Newcastle in November 2019. My collaborator, Caleb Johnston, and I are currently working with a UK-based filmmaker to create a 50-minute film based on this research.
Research Partners
Caleb Johnston, Newcastle University
Costa Compagnie, Berlin