We Have Always Been a Part of It: Centering the Transformative Potential of SOGIE Refugee Claimants' Narratives in Canada
Cultural Studies MA Thesis Defence - Saeid Safari
Event Details
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Wednesday, September 25, 2024
4:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Building: Science Complex
Room: 107
The Cultural Studies Graduate Program is excited to announce the upcoming MA defence by Saeid Safari of their thesis entitled We Have Always Been a Part of It: Centering the Transformative Potential of SOGIE Refugee Claimants' Narratives in Canada
Examining Committee:
Kelly McGuire (Supervisor) and Momin Rahman
Internal Examiner: Feyzi Baban
Chair: Liam Mitchell
Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity, and Expression (SOGIE) refugee scholarship explores intersecting power relations, including race, ethnicity, gender, class, citizenship status, and geopolitical location. A crucial intersection of these power relations is how SOGIE refugee claimants navigate the homonationalist apparatus of the Canadian refugee system, which constructs the identity category of a "genuine" or "authentic" refugee. This cultural figure is
characterized by pure victimhood, passivity, and helplessness, requiring recognition as the "right" object of compassion and pity within the homonationalist refugee apparatus. Through a comprehensive literature review and Thematic Analysis of 30 publicly available SOGIE refugee decisions in Canada, this research identifies three primary assumptions and their categories and subcategories about "deserving" SOGIE refugee claimants: The Public/Private Discourse of LGBT Rights, The Linear, Progressive Narrative of SOGIE, and The Homocolonial Inclusion of LGBT Rights. Building on the concept of "adaptive agency" and recognizing its limitations, this research discusses the transformative potential of SOGIE refugee claimants’ narratives in disrupting these assumptions through their "discursive agency," transcending the constraints of liberal notions of agency that operate within a dichotomy of resistance and compliance.
Keywords: SOGIE refugee claims, Queer migration, Homonationalism, Homocolonialism, Canadian refugee system.
Please note limited seating is available.