An exploration into the cultural negotiations of a Syrian refugee family, as they occur through participation in everyday occupations, in the context of resettling into a Scottish community.

Abstract

This proposal has explored current literature on the ways in which migrants negotiate cultures in the context of international migration. Migrants often maintain elements of their previous culture by engaging in traditional occupations. Migrants also embrace elements of the new culture in the country they have migrated to, by adopting new occupations, routines and roles. This process requires ongoing negotiation between cultures, and is part of the process in achieving acculturation. Contextual factors play a key role in migrants successfully integrating and acculturating into the new "host" country's lifestyle and culture. These include attitudes of "host" natives and different environments. The literature review highlighted a current lacking of research into refugee's resettlement experiences within a community context, specifically looking at what they do to acculturate and integrate into the "host" society. As a result, the proposed study will aim to explore the cultural negotiations of a refugee family as they occur through participation in occupation. The study will be qualitative and use a focused ethnographic approach. They study will recruit one Syrian refugee family who are resettling into a Scottish community, and use in depth semi-structured interviews and participant observations to collect data. They study will aim to understand how culture is negotiated throughout the family, what the family do to acculturate into the wider society, and the contextual factors which facilitate or hinder successful acculturation. The data will be analysed using a triangulation of methods, and themes will be developed. Respondent validation will be used to confirm the research themes and conclusions. The researcher will use reflexivity throughout to ensure the findings are accurate and unbiased. Respondent validation and reflexivity will ensure rigor.