Identity in Refuge

Identity in Refuge: The Distinct Experiences

of Asylum Seekers in Ireland

stacy vanderhurst

since the mid-1990s, Ireland has experienced unprecedented

transformation in the economic boom commonly referred to as the
“Celtic Tiger.” With an attractive corporate tax policy, a low euro,
and a large available human capital, the Irish economy was consis-
tently the fastest growing in the entire European Union, and today
Ireland ranks as one of the wealthiest countries in the world. With
strong dominance in the tech and pharmaceutical industries, Ireland
has a new face of prosperity and modernity after centuries of endem-
ic poverty and emigration in the lasting shadow of the Famine. The
Celtic Tiger thus marked not only rapid growth in the economic
sector but also accelerating social change, particularly witnessed in
the dramatic increase of migration into Ireland.
In 1996, for the first time since its Great Famine of the
1840s, Ireland turned from being a net exporter to a net importer of
people. By 2002, there were over 400,000 foreign-born people usu-
ally resident in Ireland, or 10% of the total population.1 These im-
migrants were composed of returning Irish migrants, asylum-seek-
ers, and economic migrants seeking to start a fresh life in the new
Ireland.


journal of undergraduate research

Nationality 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004

Irish 26,700 24,800 26,300 27,000 17,500 16,900
United Kingdom 8,200 8,400 9,000 7,400 6,900 5,900
Rest of EU (EU-15) 6,900 8,200 6,500 8,100 6,900 10,600
United States 2,500 2,500 3,700 2,700 1,600 1,800
Rest of World 4,500 8,600 13,600 21,700 17,700 14,900
Total 48,900 52,600 59,000 66,900 50,500 50,100

Figure 1: Immigration to Ireland Classified by Region2

With the Irish economy running at almost full employment, labor

immigrants were vital to sustaining its breakneck expansion. Howev-
er, this welcome has been perhaps less evident on the ground. A more
negative reaction has been documented in the media and scholarly
works that have identified new forms and expressions of Irish racism
to meet the increased introduction of racially diverse migrants.3
Animosity has been particularly targeted at asylum seek-
ers—individuals who have traveled to Ireland independently and ap-
plied for refugee status after their arrival. European law guarantees
them basic services while their applications are under consideration,
sparking the hostile accusations of “welfare spongers” and “bogus
refugees” who are just in Ireland to exploit its wealth and generos-
ity. They were originally entitled to the same welfare claims as Irish
citizens, but rates of application continued to increase, from fewer
than 50 applications in 1992, to over 10,000 per year in 2000-2002
and over 4,000 in 2005.4 To accommodate these numbers, the Irish
government initiated a program of dispersal and direct provision in
1999 based on a similar UK policy.
Rather than provide monetary welfare stipends for asylum
seekers to purchase their own food, rent, and other necessities as
it had done previously, the Irish government leased over 50 inns,
hotels, and hostels across the country where these needs could be
directly provided by the state. Meals are prepared by a kitchen staff
and housing is assigned by the Reception and Integration Agency
(RIA), with only a €19 weekly stipend per adult and €9 per child to

 Identity in Refuge

supplement additional requirements, including clothing, recreation,

and travel expenses. According to the Irish Refugee Council:

At the end of March 2005, there were 7,280 asylum seekers in 68

direct provision centers (4 reception and 64 accommodation centers)
of whom 1,678 asylum seekers (21%) had been residing in direct
provision for over 2 years.   A quarter (2,094) of those living in direct
provision centers are under the age of 4.5

The original goal of the Department of Justice, Immigration,

and Law Reform was to process all applications within 6 months so
no one would reside in the centers for such lengthy periods. Al-
though many asylum seekers are shuffled through multiple accom-
modation centers, the relatively permanent nature of these forced
communities makes them an interesting object of study, especially
when considered against the strong national diversity of asylum
seeker populations.
In Ireland, asylum seekers represent more than 100 different
countries, including many that are traditionally ethnically divided,
a fact that often partly explains why individuals may flee their own
countries to seek asylum in others. Accordingly, the government-
imposed residential communities should not casually be equated
with actual feelings of community across very heterogeneous refugee
populations.
Meanwhile, the emergence of refugee studies in the past few
decades, marked particularly by the establishment of the Refugee
Studies Centre at Oxford in 1982 and the associated Journal of Refu-
gee Studies founded in 1988, has focused largely on specific incidents
of a shared “refugee identity” among national or ethnic groups, most
often residing in regions neighboring the refugee-producing conflict
or comparable groups of “program refugees” that have been relocated
en masse under United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UN-
HCR) resettlement plans. Supposedly comprehensive theories have
been drawn primarily from these studies as well, producing depic-
tions of all refugee populations as diasporic communities with strong
transnational social identities and local refugee solidarity. As appli-

journal of undergraduate research

cants for legal refugee status, asylum seekers are generally presumed
to be socially synonymous with refugee populations like these, if they
are explicitly considered at all. However, asylum seekers’ experiences
abroad diverge markedly from those of other refugees.
As casually observed by Taylor, while program refugees—
those resettled en masse under the direction of the UNHCR—are
consciously settled in regions with established ethnic communities,
asylum seekers tend to travel alone (as single persons or single fami-
lies) and often resettle in areas without established ethnic commu-
nities, exhibiting little or no ties to their homeland.6 In Ireland,
asylum seekers indeed arrive alone, but are quickly housed in the
accommodation centers described above. This thesis clarifies the
distinctions between asylum seeker experiences within imposed resi-
dential communities in Ireland and the documented experiences of
other refugee populations.
Refugee theory
A refugee is formally defined through international law in
the 1951 United Nations Convention as any person who:

Owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race,

religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or po-
litical opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable,
or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection
of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside
the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events,
is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it.7

It is estimated that nearly three quarters of the world’s 12 million

refugees live in countries with per capita incomes of less than $2000,
and approximately 80% of refugees travel from one impoverished
state or region to another, while only 4% live in countries (like Ire-
land) with per capita incomes over $10,000.8 Consequently, most
academic theorizing on refugees has been founded upon the research
conducted within developing countries near the refugee-producing
conflict. For example, Stein describes the refugee camp as a basic
stage of the refugee experience, despite the fact that asylum seek-

 Identity in Refuge

ers and other refugees in industrialized countries may never have

lived in one.9 Given the very diverse and historically specific nature
of refugee situations, the assertion of any singular or generalizable
“refugee experience” is in itself problematic.
Even if such continuities could be identified across all refu-
gees, however, it would not be sufficient to prove that being a refu-
gee is actually experienced as a shared phenomenon. Avruch perhaps
is most guilty of overlooking this crucial factor, going so far as to
identify refugees not just as a social category but “as a sort of super
ethnicity”:

For it may be used to constitute a social group that is closely bounded,

ecologically situated, with a shared history (oppression, persecution,
ethnic/religious identity), a shared present (famine, isolation, uncer-
tainty, the ‘wards’ of UN and NGOs and reluctant host refuge-states)
and shared visions of the future (a state of their own, a return to the
homeland, revenge taken on their oppressors)…and the ‘culture’ of
the ‘international community’.10

Yet the hypothetical or potential unifying factors Avruch describes

are insufficient evidence that such unity and camaraderie actually
exist and are experienced by refugees. As observed by Malkki:

Researchers tend to seek to fix and make permanent something ‘es-

sential’ about these processes… positing a single essential refugee
condition… almost like an essentialized anthropological tribe…Ref-
ugees thus become not just a mixed category of people sharing a
certain legal status; they become ‘a culture,’ ‘an identity,’ ‘a social
world,’ or ‘a community.’11

Malkki, however, appears to be the exception in making this

critique while other scholars continue to homogenize refugees, first
by neglecting the lesser but still significant number of refugees who
do not fit some possible trends, and second by failing to confirm any
actual experiences of such universal solidarity in flight and exile.12
Inferences of pan-refugee culture, identity, and community are the
result of the injudicious conflation of actual, specific, homogenous

 journal of undergraduate research

refugee communities with some alleged global refugee community.

In conflict-adjacent refugee camps, all refugee residents are basically
products of the same conflict, with related though diverse or even
opposing backgrounds and beliefs. Malkki’s case study of Burundian
Hutus living in camps in Tanzania is a typical example of real com-
munity within a refugee population.13 In these types of ethnogra-
phies, it makes sense to speak of a “refugee community” where the
refugee population is relatively coterminous with specific personal
and historical experiences, often promoting particular political posi-
tions and professions of social solidarity. For instance, Avruch ex-
plicitly describes Palestinian camps as the “paradigmatic case” where
refugee camps functioned as “veritable
Maintaining a hothouses for the forced-growth and
“refugee identity” for nurturance of ethnic (or national)
these communities identities,” ultimately constituting
means maintaining “one of the prime sites of [ethnic] con-
a very specific socio- struction.”14 Many studies support
this observation, concluding that “for
political ethnic many Palestinians, nationalism, class,
identity and not a and refugee status are inextricably in-
universal solidarity tertwined.”15 One may deduce from
shared with all the the examples Avruch provides, includ-
refugees of the world. ing the Palestinian case, the Hutu case,
and others, that when refugee status
reinforces ethnic affiliations instead of superseding them, refugees
act as a sub-ethnicity rather than the “super ethnicity” Avruch claims
above.
Zetter specifically describes how the bureaucratic legal label
of “refugee” can itself become an important expression of ethno-
national political positions, as evidenced by Greek-Cypriot and Af-
rican refugees, including the Hutus portrayed by Malkki.16 These
refugees used their status and entitlements, housing especially, to
distinguish themselves from permanent residents and resist assimila-
tion, effectively maintaining aspirations of repatriation even after
extended stay in the region. Accordingly, maintaining a “refugee


 Identity in Refuge

identity” for these communities means maintaining a very specific

socio-political ethnic identity and not a universal solidarity shared
with all the refugees of the world. Kibreab (1999) uses Zetter’s study
and others to dispute directly the “anti-sedentarist” position taken
by Malkki, arguing that “most refugee communities see no future
for themselves or their offspring in their countries of asylum” and
that any (futile) efforts toward assimilation are made out of necessity
rather than desire.17 Yet, in addition to her above-cited ethnogra-
phy of the collective history and identity within a Burundi refugee
camp, Malkki’s work in Tanzania included a contrasting account of
the more cosmopolitan-minded and socially-integrated Burundian
“town refugees” in Tanzania.18
While often framing their assimilation in terms of the prag-
matics Kibreab describes, these town refugees also exhibited a more
complex social identity and more varied attitudes toward their host
country and country of origin than did the nearby camp refugees.
In the wholly more diverse social scene of urban living in Kigoma,
these refugees did not adopt the shared “mythico-history” found in
the refugee camp, and they indeed rarely seemed to willingly identi-
fy as refugees at all. Motivated by more than just practical concerns,
the town refugees expressed great ambivalence about their national
alliances, especially in reference to a hypothetical return to Burundi.
However, this is not necessarily true for all refugees in urban land-
scapes.
Many refugees living in industrialized nations, especially,
still demonstrate the same collective social identity and decidedly
liminal transnational position observed by Zetter. Marc Maguire
reveals the power of established ethnic communities and transna-
tional ties for Vietnamese refugees in Ireland, who arrived as so-
called “Boat People” in 1979 through a UNHCR resettlement plan
for “program refugees.”19 For example, many profess to have only
Vietnamese friends and desire to return to Vietnam “as much as pos-
sible.”20 This strong identification with homeland supports Östen
Wahlbeck’s general observation about the diasporic quality of refugee
communities in Europe. With references to his own research with


journal of undergraduate research

Kurdish refugees in Europe as well as other ethnographies of Viet-

namese refugees in France and Tamil refugees in Norway, Wahlbeck
argues that “the concept of diaspora, understood as a transnational
social organization relating both to the country of origin and the
country of exile, can give a deeper understanding of the social real-
ity in which refugees live.”21 The refugees in Europe that Wahlbeck
and Maguire depict thus exhibit some of the same social qualities
as those demonstrated by refugees living in conflict-adjacent com-
munities, including exclusive social networks, aspirations of return,
and political activism. However, much like the diverse population
of refugees living in the Kigoma township,22 these traits were not
shared by the asylum seekers with whom I worked on the west coast
of Ireland in the summer of 2006.

Ethnographic field site

I conducted ethnographic research at Dun Gibbons, a gov-

ernment-sponsored direct provision center in the town of Clifden,
County Galway. Local archaeologist Michael Gibbons first designed
and constructed Dun Gibbons Inn in the mid-1990s to accommo-
date the many hill-walkers and other tourists he led on daily walking
tours of the region’s pre-historical sites. However, upon discovering
an advertisement in The Irish Times seeking housing for recent asy-
lum applicants, Gibbons began a contract with the Irish government
to rent the facilities to Reception and Integration Agency (RIA).
Over the next few years over 50 centers would be similarly estab-
lished across the Irish countryside, although they varied widely in
management, location (within Ireland and relative to local cities),
and original purpose or design. Dun Gibbons Inn can in no way be
taken as “typical” of this wider system, nor can the summer of 2006
even be taken as “representative” of the years that preceded it. On
the contrary, residents, who typically live in several centers through-
out their asylum application process, regularly asserted its distinc-
tiveness, insisting “we can not compare it with other hostels.”
Dun Gibbons was first notable for its physical aspects—its


 Identity in Refuge

location, condition, and facilities. Relative to other centers that in-

cluded outdated holiday camps and youth hostels, it was a new and
high quality hotel with all expected modern amenities. Dun Gibbons
was built in a modern log-cabin style (dun is Irish for “fort”) with
wide hallways and large rooms for luggage, bicycles, and other bulky
items; a large informal dining room with views of the surrounding
hills; conference facilities for large group meetings; and perhaps most
importantly, private bedrooms for every couple or family with bath-
rooms en suite. At the peak of Irish asylum applications at the turn
of the millennium, Dun Gibbons Inn hosted over 180 residents of
all kinds. However, with fewer asylum applications overall, faster ap-
plication processing, and a transition to government-owned accom-
modation facilities for remaining applicants, by the time of my visit
in 2006, Dun Gibbons had closed off two wings of the facility and
housed a total of only 30 asylum seeker residents and one staff mem-
ber. It was also designated as a family center, meaning that no single
adults without children were permitted to live there. Each family in
Dun Gibbons had a private bedroom, although residents described
sharing rooms with other single mothers and their infant children in
other residential centers, sometimes with other grown families. The
Dun Gibbons floor plan, in contrast, offered varied room sizes and
suites with multiple bedrooms to accommodate both small and large
families. Additionally, each bedroom was equipped with new, attrac-
tive wood furnishings including head and foot boards, a desk, color
television, a dresser, and an armoire, contrasting strongly with the
metal bed frames, bunks, and modular sets found in other centers.
While many residents did regret the significant distance to the near-
est big city (a one hour bus ride costing €14.50 round trip, over 75%
of an adult’s €19 weekly stipend), most seemed grateful for its quiet
rural/suburban setting which offered scenic walks, beaches, and easy
access to town center of Clifden for shops, churches, and transporta-
tion to Galway or Dublin. As described in the General Information
leaflet distributed by the RIA to asylum seekers assigned to Dun
Gibbons.
Clifden is located in Co. Galway in the west of Ireland. It


 journal of undergraduate research

is 80 kilometers from Galway city. Clifden is part of the dramatic

mountain landscape of west Galway called Connemara. Industry in
the town is varied and includes catering to a large tourist population.
The town is well supplied with a selection of shops and entertain-
ment venues. It is located close to Clifden bay with a fine sandy
beach and a shore walk. Clifden has a population of approximately
1000 with almost 8700 living in the rural district in the vicinity of
Clifden.23
Finally, Dun Gibbons was one of only two known centers
to provide on-site preschool for residents, which offered not only
improved educational access but much appreciated and anticipated
child care relief for resident families.
“The best part of Residents suggested that Dun Gib-
living in Dun Gibbons bons was even more exceptional for
is that they allow the overall attitude and philosophy of
you to travel. We the staff and management than for its
material benefits. As an early forerun-
go to Galway and ner in the Irish Dispersal and Direct
to Dublin, and they Accommodation Programs (which
will accommodate. were inspired by similar schemes in
I left once for ten Britain), the staff at Dun Gibbons Inn
days. Other hostels played a large role in developing the
won’t let you; it’s standards and regulations that were
later adopted formally by the RIA
against the rules and and applied to accommodation cen-
you won’t get your ters across the country. Accordingly,
allowance.” Michael Gibbons always showed a
fair amount of confidence in his own
approach to managing the center, with relatively lax enforcement
of the policies that he did not support. Residents cited these rare
freedoms as great sources of comfort and relief. For example, one
woman described,

The best part of living in Dun Gibbons is that they allow you to
travel. We (herself and two young sons) go to Galway and to Dublin,

10
 Identity in Refuge

and they will accommodate. I left once for ten days. Other hostels
won’t let you; it’s against the rules and you won’t get your allow-
ance.

Residents also took advantage of the freedom to keep and eat meals
in their own bedrooms; indeed, the only mother during my stay
who regularly chose to eat in the dining room with her two young
sons later explained to me that she only started this habit when she
heard they would soon be transferred to a new center, where they
would undoubtedly enforce the official RIA policy regarding food
in the rooms. The staff of Dun Gibbons also exhibited some acqui-
escence toward the illegal employment of residents. They might, for
example, save meals past kitchen hours and ignore regular weekday
absences, recognizing that it was good for the residents to be busy
and to earn extra money for their families, and it benefited the local
community as well, economically and socially. In addition, the lib-
eral management philosophies at Dun Gibbons permitted my own
research within the center, for few other center managers were recep-
tive to the prospect of my on-site interviews, let alone my on-site
residency.

Methods

I spent two weeks doing participant observation research at

Dun Gibbons in the summer of 2006. I lived in a standard room,
ate meals with the residents, and spent time in the shared public
spaces of the center. Although my room was in a separated hallway
from that of the regular residents, I was able to spend time in some
of the rooms speaking with the residents and playing with children.
Interviews were relatively informal and open, often conducted in
the presence of children and with both spouses present. Other con-
versations and observations took place mostly in the dining hall,
patio area, and lobby. Additionally, residents were perceptibly more
comfortable talking to me with the implicit endorsement of the
trusted Dun Gibbons staff and the generally relaxed environment,

11
 journal of undergraduate research

compared to interviews and observations made at the other accom-

modation center I visited.
Dun Gibbons residents frequently commented on Dun Gib-
bons’ distinctiveness, so I also visited two other accommodation cen-
ters to gain greater perspective on the diversity of living conditions
and its possible consequences on social interactions. The Eglinton
Hotel is located in the former resort town of Salthill, just outside the
now large city of Galway and one hour south of Clifden. It supports
both families and single men and women, but it had a poor reputa-
tion among asylum seekers and staff members at Dun Gibbons for
overcrowding and strict management policies, as reported back by
former Dun Gibbons residents who had transferred to the Eglin-
ton. Though not allowed in the interior
“The ethnic of the center, I was able to conduct five
community lessens interviews in the “coffee room” adjacent
to the front lobby of the hotel. During
the danger of social my time there, men did not linger in the
and personality room, so my interviews were exclusively
disorganization, with women. Of those I spoke with at
and it provides the Eglinton, the women with husbands
a group identity were able to keep private bedrooms, while
and a network others shared space with other single
women and mothers of small children.
of relationships, Because of its higher occupancy rates and
associations, and its more urban setting, the Eglinton was
institutions.” also able to provide more services within
the hostel than Dun Gibbons, including
a variety of classes taught by local volunteers for both children and
adult residents. One such class taught several adult residents how to
build and maintain personal websites and web logs (“blogs”) which
also contributed to my research.
Finally, I spent time in Dublin contacting various refugee
agencies and activists to better ascertain the political context of refu-
gee communities. I attended the 2006 World Refuge Day Awards,
sponsored by the Africa Centre in Dublin, which honored local

12
 Identity in Refuge

people for their work in the refugee community of Ireland. I also

interviewed Jean Pierre Eyanga, the director and co-founder of In-
tegrating Ireland, an umbrella organization for immigrant and refu-
gee groups across the island of Ireland. Eyanga was coincidentally
also the recipient of the World Refugee Day “Special Judges Award,”
which is chosen exclusively by refugees themselves. I spoke with an
officer of the Irish Refugee Council (IRC), who provided me with
valuable internal reports and back issues of Asyland, the magazine
sponsored by the IRC, which features short essays by a number of
prominent academics, journalists, and activists in Ireland. Finally, I
attended a discussion, sponsored by the Institute for European Af-
fairs, on current asylum issues in Ireland with the United Nations
Assistant High Commissioner on Refugees, Erika Feller.

Social relationships among asylum seekers

Ethnic and national groups do seem to provide immediate

and functional means of support among asylum seekers. One Nige-
rian resident remarked, “I am friends with a lot of Nigerians, mostly
because [of ] the language barrier. Not everyone is fluent in English,
and we can speak in our traditional language or in traditional pid-
gin. That is what keeps people from the same nationality closer.”
As Stein observes, “the ethnic community eases the shock of adjust-
ment and transition for the refugee. It lessens the danger of social
and personality disorganization, and it provides a group identity and
a network of relationships, associations, and institutions.”24 One
Liberian-national Eglinton resident, Musu, described meeting the
other Liberian resident early upon her arrival at the Eglinton, eating
some of her first meals with her in the dining room. Although the
social benefits of ethnic communities to newcomers are relatively
obvious, Stein contends that it is only these ethnic communities that
can “allow the refugee to function,” disregarding other possible sup-
port structures that asylum seekers in Ireland utilize.25 For instance,
soon afterwards, Musu met more of the women at the Eglinton and
made better friends among them. She continued, “the one woman

13
journal of undergraduate research

from Liberia, she is ok, but most of my friends are from Nigeria, and
other places too.”
Most residents of both the Eglinton and Dun Gibbons
similarly expressed having multiple and diverse friendships, as was
supported by my own observations. Although all Dun Gibbons
residents preferred eating their meals in the privacy of their own
bedrooms (“you don’t want to eat like in a restaurant every day,”
one explained to me), they all seemed to socialize while waiting in
line for meals in the dining room. Women mostly came to retrieve
the food for their families, often with their small children running
alongside them and a baby tied to their back. They would take
back to their rooms large trays with tall mounds of rice, stacks of
bowls, and so on, but while waiting, they would converse about any
of the days’ events, perhaps a newly completed knit scarf, rumors
about transfers or decisions, or the upcoming school year. The Ni-
gerian women would often switch into English when the Georgian
or Algerian mothers approached. Personalities obviously varied, but
friendly children engaged even the quietest of residents, and mothers
would then exchange pleasantries.
Overall, residents at Dun Gibbons seemed to agree that most
people there were “friends” and got along well with each other, re-
gardless of where they came from. As Farid observed, “We have lots
of friends here. European, African, all types. I was in Lebanon and
the Sudan before, where we had [friends with] the same language
and the same religion. At first it was hard but now it is normal.” In
the words of Samuel, “with some friends here, with my family, we’re
a whole community of residents here.” This multiplicity can be
largely attributed to the imposed residential diversity of the accom-
modation centers, as well as the relaxed environment within Dun
Gibbons that reduces stress and confrontation among the residents.
As one resident explained: “Everyone living here, they are nice. I
have seen fights where we were living before… I think it is because
privacy—people [at Dun Gibbons] go to their room and mind their
business. In dining, I just have to say good afternoon. There is noth-
ing to share for fighting.”

14
 Identity in Refuge

Eglinton residents, on the other hand, laughed when I asked

if everyone there seemed to get along: “some people here are al-
ways fighting, with the staff, there’s always something.” Therefore,
resources and management policies can be as important as ethnic
differences (if not more important) in predicting social conflicts and
divisions.
Ethnicity could still contribute to internal frictions within
the accommodation centers. One East African asylum seeker in a
Limerick accommodation center was quoted in a Comhlámh (an
Irish NGO promoting global solidarity on development issues and
sponsor of a refugee solidarity group) publication as saying, “They
expect more than 100 people from different cultural backgrounds to
co-habitate like bread and butter!”26 However, of the asylum seekers
with whom I spoke, most had witnessed exceptionally strong eth-
nic groupings within the centers, but
rejected them as sometimes divisive Most asylum seekers
or subversive within the community had witnessed
setting at the accommodation centers.
One couple, for instance, described a
exceptionally strong
group of Somalis who stuck together, ethnic groupings
making other people resentful or fear- within the centers,
ful of offending them. “Gathering but rejected them as
together can push people away,” they sometimes divisive or
explained. Indeed, as one former ref- subversive within the
ugee pointed out, “for refugees, eth-
nicity sometimes is the problem,” and
community setting at
it can change the way people behave the accommodation
or relate to others. Another asylum centers.
seeker in the Comhlámh report de-
scribed that though he was still “very proud to be a Somali,” in Ire-
land, “I do not seek other Somalis, as we do not trust each other
anymore.”27 Accordingly, many residents did seem to reject ethnic
categories altogether as being not relevant to their lives in Ireland,
at least within the center, since many would still suffer ethnic or
racial bigotry within Irish society. Most asylum seekers themselves,

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journal of undergraduate research

however, professed rather liberal assessments of other social groups.

For instance, another Dun Gibbons resident, Funmilayo of Nige-
ria, explicitly insisted that you couldn’t predict a person’s character
based on ethnic or national affiliations: “We are not all the same.
Some people are good, and some people are not good, like anywhere
you go. Human beings are the most difficult of all God’s creatures
to manage. You can’t hand pick them. But good is good, and bad
is bad, and you have them in every country.” Instead, she carefully
chose her own support networks from neighbors in asylum centers
based on shared religious beliefs and parenting practices.
Ultimately, without the almost structured camaraderie of
culturally-conscious refugee resettlement plans, seeking asylum can
be a very lonely experience. Some people expressed this more explic-
itly, like Funmilayo:

Between residents, I keep mostly to myself. I try not to interfere, not

to ask too much. I only come in here (to the kitchen) to take my
food, and people might say this has happened and that’s how I would
know. But mostly I keep to myself. I’m mostly like this in Nigeria
too. Maybe it’s because my parents died when I was very young.
And in Nigeria, it’s not like it is here. It’s not like the government
and everyone is taking care of you. So I learned to keep to myself. I
have enough trouble, and I’m not wanting more. Every time I make
friends, they hurt me. There is no one I’m calling back home.

Others expressed similar, though perhaps less extreme senti-

ments, in discussions of personal support. Most women were tre-
mendously reluctant to share childcare duties, the seemingly largest
symbol of trust and reliance among individuals at the hostel, despite
constantly confessing its taxing nature. Even those who eagerly list-
ed their many friends and acquaintances admitted quickly that they
bore the weight of serious matters alone, without trusted friends or
confidantes in whom they could confide. Problems most typically
would be shared strictly with spouses, or, in the case of a single par-
ent, perhaps with a member of the staff, depending on the nature of
the problem.

16
 Identity in Refuge

Overall rejections of ethnic designations may represent a re-

jection of what has forced individual asylum seekers to seek refuge.
For many refugees and asylum seekers, basic assumptions about life
at home, as well as concepts of home itself, can be devastated during
the time preceding their flight or escape. Stein classically overem-
phasizes the necessity of ethnic support structures in general to ease
a transition from an almost idyllic home to the ‘foreign’ host coun-
try, neglecting the problematic qualities these ethnic groups or other
features may have assumed:

In the initial period, the refugees will be confronted by the reality

of what has been lost. From a high occupational and social status at
home they will plunge downward in their new land—from profes-
sional to menial, from elite to an impoverished minority. They will
confront the loss of their culture—their identity, their habits.28

However, for many refugees, it is exactly this identity that has

forced them to flee. As Malkki observes, “mass displacements occur
precisely when one’s own, accustomed society has become ‘strange
and frightening’ because of war, massacres, political terror, or other
forms of violence and uncertainty.”29 One resident suggested this
while comparing the quality of stay at Dun Gibbons with her home
in Nigeria: “I feel more at home here, because it’s not like asylum
seekers are paupers. Nigeria, as a country, is no place to stay—vio-
lence. But it is not as if we are living in trees where I come from.
So this is more like home because the environment is more like at
home.”
Thus, Stein should not assume that a loss of culture and
group identity is consistent with the “refugee experience,” not only
for refugees who have crossed local borders, but also for those who
have traveled across continents.

Integration and permanency

Many refugees insisted upon the great similarities between

Ireland and their countries of origin, often readily expressing their
17
journal of undergraduate research

love for both and their preference for Ireland, as Funmilayo does
above. For example, Farid of Algeria, observed that “there it was
quick to make friends, and Ireland is like Algerian thinking. My
cousin came here before me and he loved Ireland. All my friends
here love Ireland. It’s green, we speak English, and the people are
good… I miss family the most, but I prefer to make my life here
and return there only for holiday.” Although some residents seemed
uneasy about discussing plans for the future given the suspicions
surrounding their intentions inherent in the asylum decision mak-
ing process, those who did speak about the future seemed filled
with hope and optimism for a long, better life in Ireland, in direct
contrast to Kibreab’s (1999, 389) generalization that “most refugee
communities see no future for themselves or their offspring in their
countries of asylum.”30
Kibreab bases this assumption on his observation of “institu-
tional, structural, and attitudinal barriers [that] constrain incorpora-
tion of refugees into host societies.”31 However, many asylum seek-
ers enthusiastically described friendships and relationships with Irish
people. For example, the Dun Gibbons residents who were Chris-
tians described the great satisfaction they found in their involvement
with the local Church of Ireland. One resident actually was able to
preach there and proudly displayed the key to the church property
entrusted to him. He pointed it out to me, explaining, “We like to
contribute to the community, so we started to help. They liked what
we did so they gave me the key.” Others listed for me the people
they knew in town. For example, Funmilayo of Nigeria reported:
I know people—people from church, from the post office, from Su-
per Value. I don’t know all their names, but I know the manager of
Super Value’s name. And at the pharmacy, I know their names and
their children. And on the street, I know people. My son says hello,
and we talk and talk. And I see them with their children, so I learn
about them.
These relationships are perhaps minimal but still significant
when considered in light of the limited resources of asylum seekers,
financially and materially, since they cannot afford the pub and café

18
 Identity in Refuge

socializing of Irish culture, and sometimes cannot even invite people

into their homes at the accommodation center, according to official
center rules. Most importantly, these statements demonstrate the
positive orientation asylum seekers have toward integration in Ire-
land.
In stark contrast, the Vietnamese refugees described by Ma-
guire proclaim to have no Irish friends or, in some cases, deny even
having contact with Irish people.32 Of course, at the time of their
arrival in 1979, Ireland was even less
consciously a multicultural society, “I know people—
so barriers to these relationships may
people from church,
have proven greater, and their ex-
tended stay (now over 25 years) may from the post office,
have jaded them regarding the hope of from Super Value. I
any significant relationships with Irish don’t know all their
people, as opposed to the perhaps na- names, but I know
ïve optimism of recent asylum seekers. the manager of Super
Also significant, however, is the simple
Value’s name. And at
alternative of a real ethnic community,
consciously constructed and main- the pharmacy, I know
tained in Dublin and other large cit- their names and their
ies. In fact, the Vietnamese refugees children. And on the
were only temporarily housed togeth- street, I know people.
er upon their arrival in Ireland before My son says hello, and
being dispersed across the countryside
we talk and talk. And
in small rural towns, much like asy-
lum seekers today. However, by 1981, I see them with their
most had relocated back to Dublin.33 children, so I learn
While Dublin remains a strong immi- about them.”
grant center today, the asylum seekers
I spoke with did not necessarily wish to live there.
Many Dun Gibbons residents specifically exhibited a ten-
dency toward local integration, often declaring that, if granted the
opportunity, they would like to live locally in Clifden. All residents
described the many benefits of living in larger cities, but most ulti-

19
journal of undergraduate research

mately favored Clifden as a better place to raise a family and have

a peaceful life. As Christian observed, “We like to be in the small
community (of Clifden). It is good to bring up the children, and
to get to know people.” Another insisted, “Clifden is a nice town,
with very friendly people. It’s not like Dublin, where no one cares.
In Clifden, old and young, everyone says hello. My son has learned
this culture. He says hello to everyone who passes.” Aside from be-
moaning the limited availability of good ethnic food, few residents
expressed regret about the lack of a strong African (or Arab or Rus-
sian) cultural community, but instead emphasized the positive quali-
ties Clifden had to offer. This cultural maintenance did not appear
to be a priority when making choices (or hypothetical ones) about
their futures.
Similarly, nation-based refugee community organizations
that do exist in Ireland (mostly in Dublin) are more outward facing
than analogous refugee communities in regions adjacent to original
conflicts, with professed goals of greater adjustment and integration
into Irish society and not the preservation of cultural practices and
beliefs associated with their specific traditional society. The purpose
of Dublin’s Congo Solidarity Group, as described by its founder, is
to help individuals build “roots” in their new environment, by pro-
viding contacts—people who live in Ireland but are from their same
country of origin—to help establish bridges to the lifestyles, prac-
tices, and people of Irish society, both linguistically and culturally.
This is consistent with findings on wider immigrant populations
that have concluded, for example, that, while there are extensive
informal networks of African immigrants, there is no experience of
community among them.34 Such integration and adjustment goals
are very different from those found within refugee solidarity trends
observed by Zetter, Malkki, and others, where intense feelings of
refugee community sustain or even enhance political activism to-
ward the shared country or region of origin.
Political activism concerning home politics seems especially
feasible for Nigerian asylum seekers, given their high numbers in
Ireland. However, despite comprising nearly a third of all asylum

20
 Identity in Refuge

seekers in Ireland, ethnically-based political development akin to

that seen in other case studies is not evident from my research. All
residents with whom I spoke watched television news regularly, de-
scribing it as a welcome interruption from a long day of cartoons
and other children’s television shows. Many further insisted that
they “never miss it,” and appeared informed about topics covered.
However, none appeared exceptionally interested in news and poli-
tics from their home regions. As one Nigerian resident described:

I listen to the news all the time. I’m a news addict. RTE, Sky News,
CNN, BBC, all of them. Everything around the world; that’s why I
like CNN. Sky News, it’s always wars, fighting, knifing. But CNN
they told me about the big wig of Tesco [the supermarket magnate],
what you want to know about Africa, about the Middle East, about
many things.

Here, she actually appears to prefer global news and stories to cov-
erage of “wars” and “fighting” that may be happening in Nigeria.
Another described watching the news “every day, at 5:30, Irish news
and world news. I just want to know what’s going on where I am
from and everywhere.” Asylum seekers thus appeared significantly
engaged with current events but not especially so with home politics.
One interesting exception to this pattern is the web blog of one Ni-
gerian asylum seeker from the Eglinton, Helen, who regularly copies
briefs from the Nigerian news source Najia. She appears particularly
interested in items concerning political corruption, the oil indus-
try, and political and business relationships between Nigeria and the
United States. However, this expression of interest may be explained
in part by her apparent separation from her husband who remains
in Nigeria, forming a stronger transnational orientation than other
asylum seekers might exhibit, as well as the particular media, since
Nigerian news is only accessible on the internet while other topics
are more widely available in other forms. While understandably in-
terested in local and global politics, Nigerians and other asylum seek-
ers do not appear galvanized around the politics of their countries of
origin, reflecting a limited national identity, where one exists at all.
21
 journal of undergraduate research

Asylum seekers and refugees in Ireland tend also to reject

the label of refugee as integral to their identity, while the Greek-
Cypriot refugees Zetter described embraced it as an expression of
political allegiance to their regions of origin. As one former refugee
described to me, “being a refugee is just related to circumstance—it’s
not who I am. Changing categories create additional factors that can
be used to identify a person, maybe,
Being a refugee but it’s not essential to who I am, like
to asylum seekers my gender and so on.” Indeed, many
in Ireland is less people in Ireland enter and leave the
asylum system according to their own
about emphasizing
immediate concerns and objectives, in
a temporary and contrast to the Greek-Cypriots who
liminal position insisted upon keeping the label, even
within the host against their own interests after ten
society than it years of residence. 35 Legal categories
is a means to do not appear to be symbolically im-
portant. For instance, after the Good
obtain permanent
Friday Agreement in 1998, all children
residency rights and born in Ireland were granted Irish citi-
integration. zenship and all parents of Irish citizen
children had a right to stay in Ireland.
Individuals could apply for asylum, have a child in Ireland as an
asylum seeker, obtain residence rights under their Irish-born child
or IBC, and withdraw their application for refugee status.
Although this right was terminated under the Irish Citizen-
ship Referendum in 2004, some exceptions still apply to children
born near the time of the referendum. While I was at Dun Gibbons,
one resident received a text message from another asylum seeker (her
former roommate in a different accommodation center) that such an
exception might apply to her. Cautiously excited, she rushed to the
front desk to inquire about the rule with the staff, who had access
to a computer. Together, we looked up the policy but could not
determine exactly for whom it applied. Regardless, my point here
is that the woman at hand was genuinely elated at any prospect of

22
 Identity in Refuge

securing legal permanent residency within the state, and, in contrast

to the Greek-Cypriot refugees, was not concerned about the label it
confers.
In other words, being a refugee to asylum seekers in Ireland
is less about emphasizing a temporary and liminal position within
the host society than it is a means to obtain permanent residency
rights and integration. Staff members at Dun Gibbons even asserted
that the residents preferred not to travel together in large numbers
in public, for fear of being perceived only in collective terms as asy-
lum seekers. Similarly, in Ireland, even those who identified strongly
with fellow and former residents did not generalize the association
to all asylum seekers in Ireland, as none expressed any special interest
in news about other refugees in Ireland or elsewhere, for example.
This sentiment is echoed by the more explicit claims made by young
Oromo refugees living in Canada, who declare outright “I am not
a refugee!,” rejecting social connotations of the term despite their
indisputable legal status.36
The Canadian social connotations of being a refugee re-
jected by the Oromos are very similar to those found within Irish
society—constructions of the refugee as ethnically Other, freeload-
ing, displaced, and culturally unfit. This “anti-refugee racism” has
been well-documented in Irish academia, especially in Lentin and
McVeigh’s Racism and Anti-Racism in Ireland.37 For instance, de-
spite the strong diversity of nationalities within the asylum seeking
population and immigrants overall, the significant number of Nige-
rians applying for status (approximately 30% of all asylum seekers)
has been overrepresented in the media. Often citing them as the
source of some alleged asylum crisis or inundation, Irish media and
society often regard all black people in Ireland as Nigerian and all
of those as asylum seekers, to the point that the legal designations
of asylum seeker and refugee have become fully racialized, and the
term “Nigerian” appears to have mutated into little more than a rac-
ist slur.38 These negative associations have been exacerbated by the
flood metaphor used by popular Irish print media that run headlines
like: “A GROWING flood of immigrants…;” “Services face overload

23
journal of undergraduate research

as refugee flood continues;” “Promised land draws human flood;” “A

human tide sweeps in;” and so on, producing an image of a natural
disaster for Irish services and society.39
This perceptible hostility from Irish society toward refugees
and asylum seekers may of course diminish the desirability of main-
taining a refugee identity, forcing asylum seekers into a more assimi-
lation-oriented position than they otherwise would have assumed, as
Kibreab argues is the case of African refugees especially.40 However,
he concludes that this enmity generally prevents refugees from devel-
oping more permanent orientations toward the host country overall,
a conclusion not suggested by my own research. Instead, many asy-
lum seekers with whom I spoke expressed their desire to stay per-
manently in Ireland, as discussed above. Furthermore, rather than
maintain political involvement with their countries of origin, some
asylum seekers and refugees turned their political activism toward
Irish society itself, to better facilitate this integration process.

Exceptions: pan-asylum political activism in Ireland

It appears that only refugee activists in Ireland, which include some

asylum seekers, refugees, and former refugees as well as “native” Irish
and other immigrants, may be likely to employ the idea of a wider
“refugee and asylum seeker community” in Ireland. As the Greek-
Cypriot refugees used these ideas to express their temporary status
and political position,41 activists in Ireland also seem to emphasize
refugee community strategically. However, rather than reflect a pre-
existing actual community of people, these assertions represent a
reappropriation of a legal category to promote social solidarity as
a means toward political mobilization for greater legal and social
rights within the host society. For example, at the Dublin 2006
World Refugee Day Awards, sponsored by the UNHCR, the Africa
Centre, and other local integration and cultural organizations, many
award hosts, presenters, and recipients made public speeches calling
for greater action to assert fundamental rights of asylum, including
the right to work and the right to a fair decision hearing. From one

24
 Identity in Refuge

perspective, the event actually represented the entire refugee com-

munity of Ireland as it actually exists—that is, consisting of those
politically active members who actually experience their refugee sta-
tus collectively.
The same can be said for most public refugee figures, includ-
ing the contributing authors of Asyland, the magazine of the Irish
Refugee Council. Politically active (in the broadest sense) asylum
seekers, refugees, and migrants are self-selecting as community lead-
ers, meaning they experience these circumstances as a part of a wid-
er community. For instance, Benedicta Attoh, the former asylum
seeker from Nigeria and co-host of the World Refugee Day Awards,
ran for public office in County Louth and later wrote a reflective
essay for Asyland. She writes: “The news of the right to participate
in local Irish politics was a welcome one since we also live here as
normal and ordinary people. It then means we have a stake in the
Irish society on issues affecting us!”42 This discourse of collectivity is
perhaps illustrated in the sole auto-ethnographic or autobiographic
piece included in the seminal book Racism and Anti-racism in Ire-
land, where the author claims “the asylum community” as “my only
tribe,” brought “even closer together” by political and social repres-
sion in Ireland and “the strong emotional bond of those of us who
have been unwillingly ‘initiated’ into refugeeship.”43 Incidentally,
the author was technically admitted as an asylum seeker but arrived
in Ireland only a day before “program” refugees arrived from his
home in Bosnia. Accordingly, this account contrasts substantially
with the accounts of asylum seekers described above and can only
be understood in a context of unique social conditions and later his
own political activism.

Conclusion

Asylum seeker political self-consciousness may exist within

Irish society, but it is not the norm. Populations of asylum seek-
ers are highly diverse, distant, and disconnected from other asylum
seekers and from the societies in their countries of origin. While

25
journal of undergraduate research

many program and conflict-adjacent camp refugees desire to and

are able to sustain strong and distinct ethnic communities according
to their resettlement plans, this is not the case for asylum seekers.
Nor do the imposed residential communities of asylum seekers from
various conflicts substitute any new form of actual community. On
the contrary, when resources are limited and tension is high, they
can promote division and isolation. Management policies and re-
sources can greatly influence this process, promoting cooperation
and respect in the spirit of community, but the assumption of such
feelings is unfounded. Nothing inherent to the asylum centers, or
the experience of asylum seeking in Ireland in general, actually gen-
erates community.
Relationships are instead built through individual persons
and individual families, who remain the primary units of the asy-
lum seeking process, both legally and socially. This is in contrast
to the largely communal experiences of refugees in other contexts,
both in UNHCR resettlement plans in industrialized nations and
in UNHCR-recognized camps immediately adjacent to original
conflicts. The assumption of wider refugee trends in discussions
of asylum seekers not only misrepresents them, but also encourages
the treatment of asylum seekers as socially Other. This is a particu-
larly damning fate for those who see themselves, or hope to soon
see themselves, as quite at home in their “host” country, challenging
what it means to be Irish in the process. Indeed, this subtle transfor-
mation of the Irish identity may prove to be the ultimate expression
of the Celtic Tiger in the remaking of modern Ireland.

Acknowledgements

This research was sponsored by Barrett Family Fund of the

Nanovic Institute for European Studies and the Undergraduate Re-
search Opportunity Program (a division of the Institute for Scholar-
ship in the Liberal Arts) at the University of Notre Dame, under the
direction of Dr. Susan Blum.

26
 Identity in Refuge

Endnotes
1
Central Statistics Office, “Persons, males and females, usually resident
and present in the State on Census night, classified by place of birth 2002,”
Population Statistics (2004), Available online at: http://www.cso.ie/statistics/
personsclassbyplaceofbirth2002.htm.
2
Immigrant Council of Ireland, “Background Information and Statistics
on Immigration to Ireland,” (2005), Available online at: http://www.
immigrantcouncil.ie/stats.pdf.
3
For example, see Ronit Lentin and Robbie McVeigh, eds. Racism and Anti-
Racism in Ireland. (Belfast: Beyond the Pale, 2002).
4
ORAC, “Annual Statistics, 2005” (Office of the Refugee Applications
Commissioner, 2006), Available online at: http://www.orac.ie/pdf/PDFStats/
Annual%20Statistics/ORAC_2005_Annual_Statistics.pdf.
5
Irish Refugee Council, “Asylum statistics, for the period January to 31st
March 2005,” Irish Asylum Statistics (2005), Available online at: http://www.
irishrefugeecouncil.ie/stats.html.
6
Allison B. Taylor, “Social Services for Refugees: Parallel narratives of help
and need,” American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting (San Jose,
California: November 19 2006).
7
UNHCR, “Text of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees,”
Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, UNHCR Public
Information Section (1996), Available online at: http://www.unhcr.org/protect/
PROTECTION/3b66c2aa10.pdf.
8
USCRI, World Refugee Survey, 2006: Risks and Rights (U.S. Committee for
Refugees and Immigrants, 2006).
9
Barry N. Stein, “The Refugee Experience: Defining the Parameters of a Field
Study,” in International Migration Review 15.1/2, Refugees Today (Spring-
Summer 1981), 320-330.
10
Kevin Avruch, “Constructing Ethnicity: Culture and Ethnic Conflict in the
New World Disorder,” in American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 71.3 (July 2001),
288.
11
Liisa H. Malkki, “Refugees and Exile: From ‘Refugee Studies’ to the National
Order of Things,” in Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (1995), 511.
12
For other possible exceptions, see: D. Turton, “Migrants and Refugees: A
Mursi Case Study,” in In Search of Cool Ground: War, Flight, and Homecoming in
Northeast Africa, ed T. Allen (Oxford: James Curey, 1996).
13
Liisa Malkki, Purity and Exile: Violence, Memory, and National Cosmology
among Hutu Refugees in Tanzania, (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1995).
14
Avruch, “Constructing Ethnicity.”
15
Rosemary Sayigh, “Dis/Solving the ‘Refugee Problem’,” Middle East Report 19
(Summer 1998).

27
journal of undergraduate research

16
Roger Zetter, “Labeling Refugees: Forming and Transforming a Bureaucratic
Identity,” Journal of Refugee Studies 4.1 (1991), 39-62; Liisa Malkki, Purity and
Exile.
17
Gaim Kibreab, “Revisiting the Debate on People, Place, Identity, and
Displacement,” Journal of Refugee Studies 12.4 (1999), 389.
18
Liisa Malkki, Purity and Exile.
19
Marc Maguire, Differently Irish: a cultural history: exploring 25 years of
Vietnamese-Irish identity (Dublin: Woodfield, 2004).
20
Marc Maguire, “Belonging Transnationally: The Vietnamese-Irish Example,”
American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting (San Jose, California:
November 18 2006).
21
Östen Wahlbeck, “The concept of diaspora an analytical tool in the study of
refugee communities,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 28.2 (April 1
2002), 222.
22
Liisa Malkki, Purity and Exile.
23
RIA, “General Information on Clifden” (Reception and Integration Agency,
2004), Available online at: http://www.ria.gov.ie/filestore/publications/English-
GALWAY-Dun_Gibbons_Inn,_Clifden_FINALISED.pdf.
24
Stein, “The Refugee Experience,” 329.
25
ibid.
26
Comhlámh, Refugee Lives: The failure of direct provision as a social response to
the needs of asylum seekers in Ireland (Dublin: Comhlámh, 2001), 34.
27
ibid, 32.
28
Stein, “The Refugee Experience,” 325.
29
Malkki, Purity and Exile, 509.
30
Kibreab, “Revisiting the Debate on People, Place, Identity, and Displacement,”
389.
31
ibid.
32
Maguire, Differently Irish.
33
ibid.
34
Fidele Mutwarasibo and Suzanne Smith. 2000. “Africans in Ireland:
Developing Communities.” African Cultural Project. (December).
35
Zetter, “Labeling Refugees.”
36
Martha Kuwee Kumsa, “‘No! I’m Not a Refugee!’ The Poetics of Be-Longing
among Young Oromos in Toronto,” Journal of Refugee Studies 19.2 (2006),
230-255.
37
Ronit Lentin and Robbie McVeigh, Racism and Anti-Racism in Ireland.
38
Elisa Joy White, “The new Irish storytelling: Media, representations, and
racialized identities,” in Racism and Anti-racism in Ireland, eds. Ronit Lentin and
Robbie McVeigh (Belfast: Beyond the Pale, 2002),102-115.
39
Pat Guerin, “Racism and the Media in Ireland: Setting the anti-immigrant
agenda,” in Racism and Anti-Racism in Ireland, eds. Ronit Lentin and Robbie

28
 Identity in Refuge

McVeigh (Belfast: Beyond the Pale, 2002), 91-101.

40
Kibreab, “Revisiting the Debate on People, Place, Identity, and Displacement.”
41
Zetter, “Labeling Refugees.”
42
Emphasis added; Benedicta Attoh, “Straight from the Heart,” Asyland 10
(Autumn/Winter 2004), 18.
43
Drazen Nozinic, “One refugee experience,” in Racism and Anti-racism in
Ireland, eds. Ronit Lentin and Robbie McVeigh (Belfast: Beyond the Pale,
2002), 76.

29