The Role of Resilience: Analyzing the Different Responses to Adversity Among Refugees in the United States
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Isom, Ryan
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Abstract
This thesis analyzes the role of resilience in refugees when faced with adversity and identifying the strategies or resources used to overcome social and cultural challenges. The ethnographic information came from three separate interviews conducted over Zoom with individuals who previously held refugee status in the United States. All the interviews provided excessive amounts of empirical data that allows for an in-depth analysis of the various factors promoting resilience throughout their lives as refugees. Starting off with their time in a refugee camp before migrating to America and adjusting to a new society, then transitioning to the individual challenges they encountered and finally analyzing their resilience through the myriad resources available to them that allowed them to overcome adversity. Prevalent themes such as a sense of “community” and “cultural awareness” occurred in each interview, establishing a connection to the social challenges of being a refugee in a new society and how a sense of belonging can promote cultural agency re-enforced by their individual resiliency.
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Refugees, Adversity, African, Resilience, Community, Cultural agency