Refugee Families in the Era of Global Security

Resettling refugee families sounds like a straightforwardly noble goal. But what happens when a particular definition of the family is used to restrict opportunities for resettlement? In this episode, we speak to anthropologist Sophia Balakian about how the concerns of governments and refugee organizations with "family composition fraud" have impacted refugee families that do not fit a normative definition of what constitutes a family unit. We talk about her fieldwork between East Africa and the United States, examining the spaces of refugee resettlement and their increased securitization since the beginning of the War on Terror. We discuss how genetic testing is being used to exclude certain individuals or families from resettlement programs. And Balakian reflects on how her work involving survivors of war, genocide, and migration today relates to her own questions about the past as a member of the Armenian diaspora.

At the bottom of this post, we also offer an activity module for university classrooms that ties in with this podcast.