Middle of Everywhere - Mary Bray Pipher [11]
I apologize in advance for the terminology with which I refer to people and places. Respectful language changes monthly. Different people prefer different words. Do I refer to people as from traditional cultures, developing nations, or the Global South? Do I use the word Latino or Hispanic? What is the best way to refer to whites and nonwhites? These are highly charged political and personal questions. I am reasonably sure I will inadvertently offend someone. I have been as careful as I could be in my use of language, and no offense is intended.
I use the word American rather loosely, to refer to native-born Americans and to some others who have become citizens or lived here long enough to become Americanized. Essentially, I use the term American as a contrast word for newcomers. Almost all the refugees I discuss are new arrivals, here only a few years at most, and not yet sure what the deal is. Of course, I acknowledge that Americans are not monolithic—we have many value systems among our native-born people—and not all Americans are Nebraskans, the Americans I write about most of the time. But for brevity and flow, it's better not to constantly reclarify the word.
This book is not an academic tome or an in-depth analysis of our policies toward refugees. It doesn't tackle many systemic issues, such as the root causes of the worldwide displacement of people or the political, economic, and social issues that come with this displacement. There are academics far more competent to discuss these issues. Rather, I attempt to show, by telling the stories of real people, the effects of our current policies. My goal is to increase the interest of ordinary Americans in refugee issues with the hopes that they will then dig deeper into more scholarly works.
The United Nations defines a refugee as a person who is unable or unwilling to return to his or her country because of a well-founded fear of persecution. These claims of persecution must be based on race, religion, nationality, or membership in a particular social group or political party. Refugees are resettled in a third country when they are unable to return home and cannot stay in the camp or country in which they were granted asylum.
Latinos are underrepresented in this book even though they are the largest ethnic group in our state. I met newcomers through refugee services and most Latinos are not legally refugees and therefore do not qualify for many of the services in our community.
Of all Latino populations, only Cubans are considered refugees by our government. Colombians are not considered refugees, even though their country has 2 million displaced people and is rapidly becoming unlivable. This classification system is a remnant of the cold war. The United States government destabilized governments in Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay, and Brazil and helped build the death squads in Honduras and Nicaragua. People fleeing those places couldn't be called refugees without acknowledging our government's foreign-policy errors.
In many ways, newly arrived Latinos have the hardest time in Nebraska. They have experienced as much trauma as other groups and they tend to work under the harshest conditions in our state. However, because they are not labeled refugees, they don't get the social services other groups do. They are almost invisible except as workers. They are even called "illegal aliens" which sounds like they came from Mars.
I don't in any way attempt to discuss all refugee populations in America, just the major ones in Lincoln. There is not much in the book on the Hmong, for example, because Lincoln doesn't have many Hmong people. And I do not claim to be an expert on any of the cultures I discuss. I do try to understand and to present honestly the lives of the people I met. My hope is this presentation will give readers a glimpse of worlds they didn't even know existed in their hometowns and motivate them to discover more about these worlds for themselves.
This book is written for ordinary people, especially those who live in communities