Gender equality has been a policy goal of EU and other government institutions for over 30 years. Yet the gains in gender equality and women’s rights have been tenuous at best, with the COVID-19 pandemic only making things worse – particularly for migrant women. In fact, socio-economic outcomes for migrant women in the EU have lagged significantly behind those of men and of native-born populations since long before the pandemic. As Dr. Rachel Minto and Dr. Jasmijn Slootjes explain, the intersections of sex, gender, and migration are critical for understanding why these inequalities persist. Ho ..read more

Canada is lauded for its multiculturalism and being a welcoming host society to migrant newcomers. But discourses around settlement and integration tend to ignore the realities of Canada’s status as a settler colonial state. What would it mean to take seriously the fact that these are Indigenous lands – in some cases, unceded lands – to which Canada has no right to offer welcome? Can practices of immigration and settlement be reconciled with the possibility of decolonization? These are the questions that brought together partners in Coast Salish territories – or, Vancouver, BC – for a multi-ye ..read more

Argentina is known for its history of European immigration in the 20th century. It’s also been critiqued for the accompanying violence it wrought against Indigenous and other non-white people as it tried to establish itself as a white nation. But a UBC historian has found that in the 1910’s, Argentina used additional mechanisms to keep Asian migrants out of the country, without ever putting an exclusionary law on the books. That’s one reason these racial exclusions have been largely invisible in the historiographic record, until now. They are what historian Ben Bryce calls, ‘a story of absence ..read more

Arrest without charge, indefinite detention, traumatizing conditions: Canada has long used immigration practices akin to its more infamous neighbor to the south. But when COVID-19 drew attention to the extra vulnerability faced by incarcerated people, something began to change. UBC legal scholars Efrat Arbel and Molly Joeck found that more migrants in Canada were being released and fewer were being detained. It signaled an important shift in how immigration detention was adjudicated, and who was taken to be at risk when people crossed borders. A new progressive window was finally opening – or ..read more

In the seventh episode of the Global Migration podcast “Geographies from the Heart: Life-writing from Newcomers to Canada,” host Mohammed Alsaleh speaks to Nuria Sefchovich from Mexico. Nuria shares her experience as a mature international student and of learning to navigate a system that determines her identity based on the social construction of immigration.  ..read more

In the sixth episode of the Global Migration podcast “Geographies from the Heart: Life-writing from Newcomers to Canada,” host Mohammed Alsaleh speaks to Camille McMillan-Rambharat, from Trinidad and Tobago, who combines her unique Afro-Caribbean heritage with the stories learnt from her grandmother and father and her marriage to an Indo-Caribbean Member of Parliament. Camille is a mother and has fought battles with racism here in Canada. She continues to stand tall and stand proud ..read more

In the fifth episode of the Global Migration podcast “Geographies from the Heart: Life-writing from Newcomers to Canada,” host Mohammed Alsaleh speaks to Malena Mokhovikova who shares her family’s journey leaving Russia as asylum seekers. In 2012, Malena, with her mother and younger sister, stepped off a cruise ship temporarily docked in Quebec City and decided to claim asylum in Canada. They knew no one and spoke no English. However, the racially motivated attacks on the family’s Jewish and Afghan heritage in Russia were becoming too dangerous. Malena speaks of their ..read more

What key trends can we expect to see in Canadian migration policy during the post-Covid recovery phase, and how do these compare with developments in other major migration destination countries?  Moderated by Daniel Hiebert (Professor of Geography, University of British Columbia), with Catrina Tapley, Deputy Minister, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), and Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Convener, Transatlantic Council on Migration (TCM) and Co-founder and President Emeritus, Migration Policy Institute. This armchair discussion was part of the Symposium on the Migr ..read more

In the fourth episode of the Global Migration podcast “Geographies from the Heart: Life-writing from Newcomers to Canada,” host Mohammed Alsaleh speaks to journalists Diary Xalid Marif, from Iraqi Kurdistan, and Akberet Beyene, an exiled Eritrean journalist, who speak of the escape from their homes and the struggle to be heard.  ..read more

She’s lost three jobs in a row and might have to leave Canada if it happens again. But after a few weeks out sick, a nanny in Kelowna gets an angry call from her employer threatening to fire her for being unreliable and worried about COVID. What she does next isn’t in the script for temporary foreign workers. This episode was created as part of a research project on Temporary Foreign Workers during the Time of COVID-19, a collaboration between UBC researchers (Vanessa Banta, Gabriele Dumpys Woolever, and Geraldine Pratt) and the Migrant Workers Centre in Vancouver, BC (www.mwcbc.ca). We gratef ..read more