University of Victoria

Gender, Migration, and Citizenship II

Using a gender lens, this session will examine what citizenship means to immigrants in Canada and to trans-border migrants, including those migrants whose status is either precarious or non-existent. In Canada, nearly all forms of caring rely on migrant and immigrant labor. Within the context of mobility of people across transnational borders in a globalized neo-liberal economy, the session will focus on unfolding how some migrants negotiate citizenship, exert their agencies, while others get marginalized due to class, race, sexual orientation, nationality, and so on.

Session Chair: Habiba Zaman, Simon Fraser University

Session Organizer: Habiba Zaman, Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies, Simon Fraser University, hzaman@sfu.ca

Family and Citizenship: An Interrogation of Family-related Im/migration in Canada

Jiyoung LeeAn, Carleton University, jiyoungan@cmail.carleton.ca

This paper will investigate the familial foundations of citizenship theory, and delve into how the idea of family has been embedded and transformed in the Canadian immigration system. For these, I will use an intersectionality framework with the multiple axes of social relations including gender, race, class, sexuality and age without presuming the significance of a particular dimension. More specifically, I will trace the policy changes of family-related immigration in three distinct periods of Canadian history. I will consider (1) pre-1960s: female immigration as a racialized nation-building project; (2) between the 1960s and the mid-1990s: the heyday of Family Class immigration; (3) after the mid-1990s: decline of Family Class immigration. Throughout these three periods, the different intersection of social relations such as gender, race, class, sexuality, and age will be utilized to examine the transformation of family-related immigration in Canada.

Saturday June 8, 2013 10:45 AM - 12:15 PM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-062

I am a Racialized Immigrant Woman: I am Unemployed and Poor

Somayeh Bahrami, Simon Fraser University, sba39@sfu.ca

Majority of previous research on economic performance of immigrant population had been based on the significance of assimilation theory, which concludes that immigrants will experience upward mobility if they aim to work hard and achieve the necessary skills to participate in the labor market. On the other hand, some studies have shown that racialized immigrant communities are overly represented among the poor. Therefore, many have questioned the validity and reliability of assimilation theory in order to address what they view as the realities of immigrants’ economic integration. Within frameworks of political economy, this comparative study evaluates assimilation theory, social capital and politics of social exclusion through examination of intertwined aspects of race, gender and immigration/ citizenship status to see whether high level of education can make an improvement in financial well- being of racialized immigrant women in Canada.

Saturday June 8, 2013 10:45 AM - 12:15 PM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-062

Discourses of racism in the lives of professional Indian and Chinese women immigrants in Canada

Tania Das Gupta, York University, tdasgu@yorku.ca

India and China have become major source countries of immigrants to Canada. This reality suggests that Canadian immigration policies are no longer based on racism as it had been until the establishment of the Points System in 1967. This is a source of debate, however even if it were true, the subsequent reality of immigrants with regard to actually pursuing the professions for which they have spent years qualifying for and subsequently practicing, points to persisting racial barriers emanating from institutional policies and procedures (e.g. professional associations) and from individuals who actually put policies into practice, such as recruiting agents, human resource personnel and employers in general. Foreign-trained professional immigrants are subjected to systemic processes of devaluation and racialization in the labour market. As women, they are additionally subjected to sexism in the immigration process, in the labour market as well as in their own households. They migrate as “dependents” of their husbands who are viewed as “heads of households”. Most of these so-called “dependent” immigrant women, however, happen to be highly educated and trained professionals just like their spouses, having worked for many years in high-powered jobs. In fact, husbands are awarded additional points for their wives’ qualifications. However, upon attaining landed status in Canada, they , like their spouses, soon realize that they have been excluded from working in their own fields. As highly educated professionals, they, like their male counterparts, are almost always members of the upper classes in their originating countries. They have privileged backgrounds and resources due to which Canada has judged them to be ideal candidates as permanent residents.

The experiences of professional immigrant women in Canada are not often the subject of study. This paper arises out of a two-year collaborative and comparative study of 12 Indian and 11 Chinese professional immigrant women in Toronto (Canada) focusing on their labour market experiences. Life history-style interviews were conducted to uncover their experiences around their immigration, their job search, (non)utilization of their prior professional experience, discrimination and racism, their own responses and efforts to re-invent themselves, including their skills in order to make themselves marketable. In this paper, however, I will particularly focus on “race”. racialization and racism as these were articulated by them in our conversations. Although this was not the explicit focus of our interviews, many remarked about their feelings about such things in passing. How did they make sense of racism? How do they see themselves as immigrants in relation to other immigrants of colour and to whites? How do these ideas connect with received ideas about “race” and “Canadian Nation” within (post)colonial contexts in India, China and Canada?

Saturday June 8, 2013 10:45 AM - 12:15 PM Building: Elliott Building, Room: E-062