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Elderly

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CHAPTER 4
Muslim Refugee Populations and Special Concerns

Refugees’ responses to individual challenges and opportunities are determined by a number of factors, including religion, gender, culture, ethnicity, social class, and previous life experiences. For Muslim refugees, these may include specific cultural or religious factors of which service providers need to be aware. This awareness will enable service providers to understand each client within the context of these factors and the client’s total experience.

Muslim women, like women from most cultures, are socialized to consider the needs of other family members before their own.

Women

Islam emphasizes the equality of all people, and, according to the teachings of Islam, men and women are equal in the eyes of God. Each is responsible for his or her actions, and each is to be knowledgeable of the faith. Islam gives women the right to decide on marriage, divorce, and inheritance. They may maintain their own personal property and wealth, even if they are married. Women play important roles within the family and in the community in socializing children, and in significant activities related to charity, life cycle rituals, transmitting religious beliefs, and family and religious traditions.

However, there are considerable differences among Islamic communities regarding the role of women. Some Islamic countries have laws that limit active roles for women in the public sector. Most Muslim families are patriarchal, with males in the households holding positions of authority, and some Muslims interpret their religion as requiring the submission of women. Many Muslim refugee women have lived in cultures where they have been subordinate to males in their households.

In the patriarchal societies of origin, men are socialized as heads of households and breadwinners, while women are usually socialized to take responsibility for child care, elder care, management of illnesses, and household work (e.g., cleaning, cooking, washing, acquiring water and fuel, purchasing food, clothing, and other household supplies, and tending kitchen gardens and small livestock). Muslim women, like women from most cultures, are socialized to consider the needs of other family members before their own.

However, this is not to say Muslim women refugees have not been active outside their homes. In most Islamic cultures, women participate in many farming tasks, operate small businesses, have blue-collar and white-collar jobs, and advance in professional vocations. Only in a few Islamic cultures are women generally confined to their homes. These customs vary widely, not only across Islamic countries, but also within the countries.

Interpretations of Islam that lead to subordinate roles for women may raise challenges in the resettlement process, specifically in terms of education, health, and employment. At the same time, however, women’s experiences in the countries of origin or countries of first asylum may have prepared them better than men for the adjustment to household responsibilities in the United States and for entry-level employment. The roles for which women have traditionally been socialized, such as parenting, caring for family members, sustaining traditions, and managing the day-to-day operations of the household, remain the same upon resettlement. In addition, refugee women may find and be willing to accept entry-level or blue-collar jobs more readily than the men in their families. Thus, women play significant roles during resettlement, not only in nurturing their family members, ensuring the socialization of their families, and sustaining cultural and religious continuity, but also in contributing to the economic self-sufficiency of the family.

Some of the challenges for Muslim refugee women in America arise from their real or perceived subordination to men and from related misperceptions or prejudices against them. These include:

Employment: Many Muslim refugee women are employed in the United States, while in some families the men may be more likely to be unemployed, intermittently employed, or underemployed. For some families, this situation will be so contrary to cultural norms that it will cause significant stress between men and women in the household.

Multiple burdens: Whether they have jobs or not, and even when their husbands are not employed, women are expected to be the homemakers, to take responsibility for the children’s behavior, and to develop the children’s religious and cultural knowledge. Newcomers to American society also have to learn about parental responsibilities such as participating in Parent Teacher Associations, advocating for children who may be underachieving at school, and guiding children as they face social risks quite different from those the parents knew in their home countries. This combination of responsibilities can be daunting and exhausting for Muslim women refugees.

Social support: Muslim refugee women in the United States often lack the traditional supports they have relied on from their family of origin, in-laws, or friends and neighbors. Reluctance to rely on non-relatives or professional counselors and social workers can be a barrier to be overcome during the first few years of resettlement. Women bear the burden of developing new support networks and learning to accept help from professional service providers.

Predispositions of men: Muslim men from some parts of the world are active participants in the education of their children and in certain household responsibilities, such as grocery shopping, while others may not have been socialized to take a share of the burdens of household chores and the responsibilities for day-to-day care of children. When helping Muslim refugee women sort out the management of day-to-day responsibilities, service providers need to determine what roles are played by the man or men in the household and not assume that all such tasks fall to the women.

Clothing: One of the challenges for Muslim women arises from their choice of clothing. The injunction to dress modestly is incumbent on men and women, but the social impact is strongest on women. As with any other religious or cultural practice, family/peer/community pressures are important factors in a woman’s decision about covering. The hijab often evokes negative feelings in people from Western cultures. However, service providers can be understanding of and support the choice of a woman or a young girl, not viewing it as a sign of oppression, but rather as a commitment to her beliefs.

Gender segregation: Muslim refugee women come from both gender-segregated and gender-integrated societies. Women from gender-segregated societies develop strong and effective networks parallel to those of men, and have the capacity to make decisions and manage their responsibilities. Service providers can encourage Muslim women to transfer these skills and adapt them to their lives in the United States.

Muslim women’s roles during resettlement, and the consequences of resettlement on their lives and on their place in their families and in larger society, have not been extensively researched. Feminist literature on women refugees often states that women face more serious challenges than men, are more oppressed, and receive minimal resources, and Muslim refugee women are often presented as passive, helpless recipients of harsh treatment. However, such limited perceptions of women’s experiences prevent observers from understanding how Muslim refugee women actively participate in multiple roles to resettle themselves and their families successfully.

It is important not to underestimate the capabilities of Muslim women because the stereotype of being submissive is so strong. Muslim women’s organizations such as the North American Council for Muslim Women, Muslim Women in the Arts, and local associations in mosques, have been established to celebrate achievements and to address challenges Muslim women face in the United States. In addition, Islamic communities are recognizing the challenges involved in adapting to U.S. culture, especially for those with limited resources, those with limited formal education, those from rural areas, and those who are homebound. As a result, many mosques have developed programs with functions that range from tutoring for children, English language classes, job searching, and housing assistance, to more socially sensitive programs, such as response to domestic violence and support for youth confronting social perils.

Service providers can benefit from learning about these groups and helping refugee women to connect with them when appropriate. In refugees’ countries of origin, mosques are often not social service organizations, so Muslim women may not realize that mosques have taken on this function in recent years in the United States. Service providers can thus be an invaluable link between refugee Muslim women and organizations that can help them.

Many Muslim refugee children embrace religious and cultural traditions and manage to integrate themselves well into American society.

Children

Refugee minors have three significant non-material needs: identity, language, and religion. A Muslim refugee child must negotiate at least four sets of values: 1) his or her family’s culture, 2) U.S. cultural norms as learned within the context of the education system, 3) the culture communicated by peers and the mass media, and 4) the teachings of Islam.

Negotiation of identity is ongoing as the child settles into a new life in the United States. Parents are often not in the best situation to help their children through this bewildering process, because they may be busy focusing on survival issues and may have their own losses to deal with and adjustments to make. In addition, parents’ concept of American society is often limited by what they have seen in the news and entertainment media and by information from recently arrived refugees and immigrants.

Observant Muslim parents are obliged to ensure that their children are raised with an understanding of Islam and live their faith. However, some parents may not recognize the differences between cultural traditions from the home country and Islamic practice as taught in the mosque. For example, although the Qur’an does not address career choices and does not indicate that parents should choose children’s marriage partners, many Muslim parents do choose their children’s careers and spouses, believing these are Islamic injunctions.

Adults may invoke the authority of religion when exhorting youth to acquiesce to tradition. Teenage refugee girls in particular may struggle with traditional cultural practices if they are in a family that severely constrains women. While it is useful for service providers to know something of what is religion and what is culture, it is also important that service providers not undermine family cohesion—and the family’s trust in the service provider—by suggesting to the youth that the family adults are wrong about whether constraints on women or other customs are rooted in Islam.

Parents often try to manage problems by pressing their children to conform to their cultural behavioral expectations. Many Muslim refugee children embrace the traditions and manage to integrate themselves well into American society. Some others are able to negotiate parental demands and expectations; others manage by hiding their activities from their parents; and still others may be attracted to risky behaviors. They may turn to their peers for answers to their questions, or to school counselors, or to youth leaders in their mosques. Enlightened Muslim community leaders and caseworkers can play significant roles in guiding children to mitigate social risks.

Refugee children may experience prejudice or hostility at school, largely because they are foreign-born, are refugees, have a different appearance, and may have language constraints. For Muslim minors, the negative public stereotypes about Muslims exacerbate these causes. The prejudice or hostility can be manifested as cruel humor, as shunning, as hazing, or in outright physical abuse. Muslim refugee children who experience prejudice and hostility may come to feel inferior and ashamed or may become angry and defensive. Service providers who know the refugee family can support parents and the community in responding to such incidents as they arise and in advocating policies and programs that discourage such behavior and encourage better attitudes. On a personal level, the service provider can encourage family members to acknowledge the hurt and the social wrongness, while helping the child feel worthwhile and important. The broader approach needs to include not only Muslim refugee children, but also non-refugee and non-Muslim students.

As is the case with all refugees, some Muslim children become separated from their families or orphaned, and some of these are eligible to enter the United States through the refugee unaccompanied minors program. In addition, Muslim children enter the foster care system for a variety of reasons, including death or illness of a parent or guardian, neglect, and abuse. An accepted best practice of social work, encouraged by the U.S. State Department and other agencies, is to place children in foster or adoptive families that practice the religion into which the child was born. The number of Muslim refugee children needing such placements is relatively low because informal adoption in home countries is widely practiced. However, it is important to place Muslim children in Muslim families, and this may require special recruitment efforts on the part of service providers because the idea of formal foster care is a new one in Islamic communities in the United States. Child Protective Services and local Islamic communities can reach out to each other to ensure the availability of licensed Muslim foster parents. A brochure is available from the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (Maloof, 2002b) as a starting point in the recruitment of Muslim foster homes.

If a Muslim child is placed in a non-Muslim home, it is important for the foster family to be sensitive to the religious and cultural needs of the child. The section on education contains suggestions for working with the child’s school. The concepts of modesty, food restrictions, and concerns such as dogs in the house are also important to keep in mind. In addition, as children mature, their self-identity deepens and their awareness or interest in religious beliefs may waver between strong belief and doubt. Girls may choose to wear hijab or to discontinue wearing it. Young people may or may not follow through on their daily prayers. It is important for non-Muslim foster parents to help the Muslim children in their homes to work through these issues by listening and talking with them. The foster parents should learn about the holy days the child is used to celebrating, including a) why these days are important; b) how the child would want to celebrate them; c) the child’s level of comfort at a particular mosque; and d) if there is a person or family from the same ethnic and Islamic community who can serve as a religious mentor.

Like all refugee children, Muslim children need time to heal as they try to cope with the traumas they have experienced in their home country, during their perilous journeys, in the country of first asylum, and in the strange country of resettlement. They need to overcome the effects of these traumas in order to develop a bicultural identity and a positive sense of who they are. All of this takes time, negotiation, and guidance.

Muslim refugees have adapted to life in the United States and have become sources of support within family contexts, taking responsibility for rearing and socializing their grandchildren when both parents have to work.

The Elderly

Many experiences of elderly Muslim refugees parallel those of other elderly refugees. Refugee seniors experience the most losses compared to other age groups. There are unique struggles resulting from the heavy demand for new learning. They may experience a lifetime language barrier, lack access to medical care, lose esteem within the family, and lose independence. They may have lost their social network, and often find it is difficult to recreate one. It is common for the elderly to become isolated. Those who are frail and homebound are at greater risk of injury and depression.

Elderly refugees are expected to make two major adjustments: (1) a change in status, from being heads of households who are revered for their age and experience, to being dependent on their adult children and grandchildren, who may consider the elder’s experience and knowledge to be mostly irrelevant; and (2) a change in lifestyle, from being immersed in a community of co-nationals and co-religionists to being on the edge of a community of unfamiliar people from different backgrounds. This is in addition to each refugee’s adjustment to the personal losses and traumas of the refugee experience.

As refugees, many elderly Muslims are dependent on their adult children and extended families for coping with the day-to-day challenges of life in the United States. In addition to the stress of adapting to a foreign culture and economic dependence, they have to manage problems arising from their changed roles, intergenerational conflicts, language barriers, social isolation, and health problems related to the aging process, which is often compounded by their mental health status.

Elderly Muslim refugees who have endured the deaths of their spouses and of some of their children may want to cling to their grandchildren and may fear that those grandchildren will be lost to a different lifestyle, different cultural mores, and perhaps even anti-Muslim sentiments. Their grandchildren’s participation in activities such as shopping in malls with friends unaccompanied by adults, wanting to go out on dates, and making decisions on their own without consulting with parents may generate a great deal of anxiety. They may become resentful or depressed if their traditional responsibilities as grandparents are minimized because their grandchildren do not see the grandparents’ experiences and stories as sources of guidance.

However, not all elderly refugees are helpless and dependent. Over time many have adapted to life in the United States and have become sources of support within family contexts, taking responsibility for rearing and socializing their grandchildren when both parents have to work.

Within Muslim families, parents traditionally are highly revered and the elderly are greatly respected. Adult children and grandchildren may feel guilt because they are not able to support their parents as is expected. Family members may manage these guilt feelings by minimizing communication with their elderly relatives. Family members may also think that accepting assistance for the elderly member(s) of the family is tantamount to acknowledging that they or other family members are neglectful.

In addition, while family members are responsible for caring for their elderly relatives with respect and dignity, the responsibility for elderly persons who do not have living children or extended family falls on the larger Islamic community. Like other ethnic refugee communities, Islamic communities have established support programs to serve elderly refugees and their families. The programs vary and include services such as emergency support in times of crisis, transportation to prayer halls and social gatherings, and in some cases, access to culturally competent health and mental health service providers. Senior outreach programs from the Islamic community or from the larger community can help service providers recognize those elderly who need assistance and provide resources or solutions to which the service provider can direct elderly Muslim refugees and their families. Service providers may also be able to help families understand that giving and receiving assistance or services from outside the family is a normal and acceptable part of living in the United States.

Muslim men are socialized to be providers and family heads. In the public arena, they are "the face of the family;" at home, they are closely involved in family life and the care and raising of their children.

Men

Muslim men are socialized to be providers and family heads. In the public arena, they are “the face of the family;” at home, they are closely involved in family life and the care and raising of their children. They accompany their wives and children to medical appointments and on other family excursions, and take a close interest in their children’s academic progress. This behavior grows out of the traditional context of caring and taking responsibility for one’s family, rather than from a desire to exercise power and control. Service providers can build on this by taking care to involve Muslim men in as many family-oriented decisions and activities as possible.

The refugee experience and resettlement in the United States can be as daunting for Muslim men as it is for male refugees from other backgrounds. Those who lack English language skills, or whose professional credentials and work experience are not recognized by U.S. institutions, may not be able to find work in their professional fields or in any comparable area, and some may not find work at all. They may feel completely dislocated from the social and professional contexts that have been the source of their identity and self-esteem throughout their adult lives.

In response, some Muslim men may turn to self-destructive behaviors as coping mechanisms. Others may turn to a stricter observance of Islamic traditions as a way to hold on to something familiar and protect themselves and their families from the new and alien environment. They may require their wives to wear hijab, even if they did not do so in their country of origin, and may become more controlling of where, when, and with whom their wives and children may go outside of the house.

The tension and threat that Muslim refugee men feel can be exacerbated when their wives are more successful than they at finding work and adapting to the new environment. When the wife becomes the main source of support for the family, the role change challenges fundamental concepts of the relationship between men and women. Some men may respond to this challenge by becoming verbally or physically abusive toward their wives, their children, or others.

Service providers need to be aware of these tensions and their potential repercussions, and understand that attempting to exclude problematic male members of a family may exacerbate the situation. Instead, service providers can include husbands and fathers as frequently as possible in meetings with their wives and children. Doing so will encourage development of a relationship of mutual trust that will help the men become more willing to accept assistance and recommendations.

Service providers also need to be aware that many Muslim men will not feel comfortable discussing problems, or even acknowledging the existence of problems, with a stranger, especially with a woman. Providers who have connections with support services provided by local mosques and other Islamic organizations may be better able to connect Muslim refugee men with sources of assistance with which they feel comfortable.

The Cultural Orientation Project--http://www.culturalorientation.net, for more information contact sanja@cal.org
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