Gender identity and integration: second-generation Somali immigrants navigating gender in Canada

ABSTRACT

Many right-leaning politicians claim that normative Islamic perspectives on gender are at odds with the Western values and act as barriers to immigrant integration. Our interviews with 256 second-generation Somali-Canadians, however, suggest that gender-egalitarian identities are achieved – they are constructed and deployed by our participants to practice integration and express belonging in Canada. In this study, we move beyond analysis of attaining gender-egalitarian roles as a result of immigration and propose an understanding of gender as a form of Bourdieusian cultural capital that, depending on social values, functions as symbolic capital rendering individuals and groups as advantaged or disadvantaged. We, therefore, analyse modalities of “doing” gender as potential strategies of accumulating capital in furthering successful integration. Our study contributes to the emergent literature in migration studies that examines gender in relation to ethnic and national identities, and the extent to which it may impact integration experiences of second-generation Muslim immigrants.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender
• integration
• second generation
• Somali
• Canada
• multiculturalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 From 2003 to 2006, heated debates around the introduction of legal practices based on Sharia law, particularly around family faith-based tribunals, turned into debates on women’s rights and Canadian identity leading to the reinforcement of the idea that Islam is against gender equality. In 2006, the Ontario legislature ruled to exclude all religious arbitrations in Ontario.

2 Unless otherwise indicated, we are using our most representative interview material to demonstrate our findings.

Additional information

Funding

This study received Ethics Approval by the University of Alberta Research Ethics Board (Pro00041472) and was funded by the Kanishka Grant/Public Safety Canada Project and the Canadian Research Network on Terrorism, Security and Society (TSAS).