Understanding Connections Between Mobility, Transportation, and Quality of Life in Refugee Communities in Tucson, Arizona

In this multidisciplinary research project we aimed to study mobility challenges that refugees in Tucson, AZ, experience after their resettlement. Using qualitative and quantitative data collected from interviews and survey data, we argue that mobility shapes the ways refugees foster social connections, attain employment and access educational opportunities. Accordingly, barriers to mobility negatively impact refugees’ perception of well-being in post resettlement. However, these challenges are not experienced evenly. Nor are refugees passive subjects who lack agency in overcoming various barriers they experience. The study reveals the resilience of the refugee community in navigating the intersectional challenges they confront related to their mobility. We hope that the implications of this study can inform various stakeholders to better support refugees in navigating existing mobility and transportation challenges and to promote policy change that can increase better spatial mobility for all Tucson community members

“Mom, I want to come home”: Geographies of compound displacement, violence and longing

This article focuses on former "comfort woman" Gil Won-ok's story to explore the dialectical relationship between place and self, or what Edward Casey calls the "geographical self." Gil was one of thousands of women who were used as sex slaves by the Imperial Army of Japan at "comfort stations" during World War II. Taken from her hometown of Pyongyang when she was fourteen years old, Gil endured years of compounding violence in displacement away from her family and homeland. Today, at age 92, Gil still does not know what happened to her family as the division of Korea prevented her from returning home, extending her displacement. Despite the scale and brutal nature of this state-sponsored violence against thousands of young women and girls, geographic scholarship is critically lacking in addressing this violence. We hope to fill this gap. Theoretically, the article contributes to the broader literature on the dyad of place and self, and we do so by broadening the discussion of the geographical self to better understand the violence of displacement and longing for one's lost place. But most importantly this article would make a modest contribution of recognition to Gil's long struggle and perseverance.24 month embargo; published online: 25 January 2020This item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at [email protected]

Contradictions of Populism and Resource Extraction: Examining the Intersection of Resource Nationalism and Accumulation by Dispossession in Mongolia

We examine contradictions of populism and resource extraction in Mongolia in the context of the recent presidential election of Khaltmaa Battulga, who is often portrayed as dangerously populist. We consider Battulga's victory as an echo of Mongolian voters' sense of dispossession and discontent driven by gross wealth disparity and precarious livelihoods. Rather than treating these concerns as mere tools of the populist political agenda, we view them as moments of resistance to the asymmetry between accumulation and dispossession in Mongolia, a central outcome of twenty-five years of the neoliberal regime. We situate our analysis of Mongolia's resource politics through an examination of the world's second largest undeveloped copper-gold mine, Oyu Tolgoi. The mine offers a window into the country's turbulent resource politics that has concentrated wealth among a powerful few while nearly one third of Mongolians remain trapped in vicious poverty. Relying on fieldwork conducted over several years, the article argues that public grievances against the asymmetry of accumulation and dispossession are routinely discounted by discursive tools within the populist paradigm. "Resource nationalism," in particular, is used by those who promote neoliberalism and the open market as a pejorative label to silence public grievances.Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, York University; American Center for Mongolian Studies; Henry Luce Foundation; U.S.-Mongolia Field Research Fellowship Program - American Center for Mongolian Studies; Council of American Overseas Research Centers; U.S. State Department Educational and Cultural Affairs Bureau; Metropolitan State University of Denver; Department of Social Anthropology, University of Cambridge; School of Geography and Development, University of Arizona12 month embargo; published online: 8 November 2018This item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at [email protected]

Understanding Connections Between Mobility, Transportation, and Quality of Life in Refugee Communities in Tucson, Arizona

69A3551747112In this multidisciplinary research project we aimed to study mobility challenges that refugees in Tucson, AZ, experience after their resettlement. Using qualitative and quantitative data collected from interviews and survey data, we argue that mobility shapes the ways refugees foster social connections, attain employment and access educational opportunities. Accordingly, barriers to mobility negatively impact refugees\u2019 perception of well-being in post resettlement. However, these challenges are not experienced evenly. Nor are refugees passive subjects who lack agency in overcoming various barriers they experience. The study reveals the resilience of the refugee community in navigating the intersectional challenges they confront related to their mobility. We hope that the implications of this study can inform various stakeholders to better support refugees in navigating existing mobility and transportation challenges and to promote policy change that can increase better spatial mobility for all Tucson community members