Negotiating existence: asylum seekers in East Anglia, UK.
Date
2008
Authors
Corfield, Sophia
Editors
Advisors
Gray, John
Skuse, Andrew John
Skuse, Andrew John
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Type:
Thesis
Citation
Statement of Responsibility
Conference Name
Abstract
This ethnographic study of asylum seekers in East Anglia, UK, poses the following questions: how do asylum seekers adapt, cope and adjust to life in the UK when their future is so uncertain? To what extent do people seeking asylum relate to an asylum seeker identity? How do asylum seekers negotiate interactions with others as they await an outcome to their application for asylum? This study explores these questions in an effort to gain insight into the role of identity reconstruction during the process of asylum seeking.
This thesis is based on twelve months of fieldwork in the towns of Norwich and Great Yarmouth, and to a lesser extent in Peterborough and London, where asylum seekers had been dispersed by either the London Boroughs or the Home Office’s NASS (National Asylum Support Service). During 2002 and 2003, I conducted fieldwork amongst asylum seekers, as well as amongst support workers working for various NGOs that offered a number of support services for asylum seekers.
The focus on asylum seekers’ speech-acts is a method to observe the primary form of social action by which asylum seekers articulate a shared place, liminal immigration system and interaction with others. These elements shape asylum seekers’ identity in the UK. Consequently, asylum seekers’ predicament can be understood as a movement through the immigration system, but also an existential movement as each person tries to negotiate their existence.
School/Discipline
School of Social Sciences : Anthropology
Dissertation Note
Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Social Sciences, 2008
Provenance
Copyright material removed from digital thesis. See print copy in University of Adelaide Library for full text.