Migration, Displacement, and Refugees

I believe that higher education needs to change if it is going to be useful in the current climate. Universities need to shift away from being producers and regurgitators of knowledge. They instead should be seen as valuable community resources. Students should leave a college classroom not just with information about a problem, but with an understanding of 1) who the problem affects, 2) why they should care, and 3) what they can do about it. I am interested in participating in the Teaching Social Action course development program because I have been teaching community engaged learning classes and I would like to take them to the next level to include a social campaign. I do not feel equipped to do that yet. In a world where students can get any information they want at their fingertips, a university education needs to look different. I would like to expand my teaching so that I can work to empower students to do something with the knowledge they have. That being said, I think there are some real limitations to the service learning model that has come to dominate much of higher education. Students should see themselves as part of the community - not just as visitors who can help out. It is my hope that engaging in this workshop will provide me with the language and skills to include this perspective in my classroom.

In this class, we will ask what it means for people to be forced from their homelands in the face of violence, persecution, poverty, or environmental destruction. We explore displacement and migration, not as a problem to be solved, but as sites of social and political critiques of colonization, war, human rights, and structural violence. We will address factors that lead people to flee their homes as well as the physical and emotional traumas involved with leaving one's home under duress and the obstacles and opportunities awaiting them in the new home countries. The foundational question that we will seek to answer in this class is: Why do migrants and refugees present such a problem in the world today?

In posing this question, we will also explore several sub-questions:

• Who gets to be defined and accepted as a refugee? Who is defined as a migrant? What differentiates a refugee from a migrant and others who may leave or flee their countries of origin?
• What are the challenges involved with moving to a new country? What policies and procedures impede and support their movement? How are they treated upon their arrival?
• What cultural adaptations are needed both on the part of the new arrivals and the residents of the recipient countries?

Andria Timmer

Associate Professor

Sociology, Social Work, and Anthropology

Christopher Newport University